Carrefour's lead over Real and Kaufland narrows

Carrefour hypermarket network last year stayed above the 1bn-euro threshold in terms of sales, but in 2010 it will struggle more than ever to keep its leading position on the market.

Germany's Real and Kaufland networks have been rapidly catching up counting on an aggressive expansion strategy, and the plans the two retailers have announced for 2010 will pose a serious threat to Carrefour in the context where the French company has significantly slowed down hypermarket expansion pace.

In 2009, the first year it coped with consumption declines in Romania, Carrefour finalised just two of the seven new hypermarkets it had planned on paper before the crisis.

On the other hand, Kaufland and Real also bet on speedy expansion and finalised six and four new stores, respectively.

For the first time since it entered the Romanian market, in 2001, Carrefour French group, the second largest player in domestic retail after Germany's Metro, last year generated sales worth almost 1.14bn euros in Romania, with 22 operational hypermarkets and 25 supermarkets, down 4.6% from 2008, in the wake of falling consumption.

Sales in RON continued to rise, though, with a 9.4% advance being reported for the above-mentioned interval as a result of the expansion of the two operated networks.

Last year, Carrefour opened two hypermarkets domestically, in Oradea and Bucharest, and also added 6 new locations to its supermarket network, in the wake of total investments ZF puts at over 50m euros.

2009 was the first year when Carrefour closed a store in Romania. After Armonia mall of Braila was closed, the French company had to give up this location. The group also gave up its travel operations by closing Carrefour Voiaj Romania agencies.

Despite this activity cutback, Carrefour is still expected to be a dynamic retailer in terms of expansion domestically in the following years, though the growth pace will not be as fast as in the 2006-2008 period.