Darrell Stanaford, Adviser Director General at RD Management, spoke to the magazine CRE Retail about the formation of the market for hypermarkets in Russia.
New formats of retail centers not only change the shopping habits of buyers but also the urban environment. Research has shown that the most important retail trend of the past 15 years is not visits to the cinema, food courts or nail bars but rather “shopping with carts” and trips to store to buy products once a week. Despite the large traffic jams and crowded stores, consumers are not ready to stop visiting hypermarkets. Moreover, as the number of traditional outdoor food markets contracts, the number of hypermarket shoppers could further increase.
“The pioneer in the creation of supermarkets in Russia was the Turkish company Enka, which in the 1990s introduced its Ramstore food supermarket chain. And then Perekriostok and Sedmoi Kontinent emerged,” Darrell Stanaford notes. It was their success which inspired such players like Aucham and METRO Cash&Carry to come to Russia, the expert believes.
You can read more about how shopping centers influence social behavior in the September issue of CRE Retail.