Swedish trendsetters set up shop

As the Polish economy, despite the recent slump, is gradually maturing, established foreign investors are beginning to deem now as the right moment to move into the market. Swedish clothes retailer Hennes & Mauritz, better known as H&M, has just announced plans to move into Central Europe, with stores in Warsaw and Prague scheduled to open in March 2003. H&M was established in 1947 and opened its first stores abroad in the 1960s. It has since been steadily expanding, and now has more than 800 stores worldwide. The group had a turnover of €5.2 million last year. Its first Polish store will open in Warsaw’s Wola Park shopping centre, which opened earlier this autumn. Carl-Henrick Enhoerning, head of investor relations at H&M, said the company had been sizing up the Polish market for a year before deciding to move in after the summer. Polish H&M operations will be linked with and supervised by the German H&M division. Initially the managerial staff will also come from the German H&M, but the company intends to replace them with local executives as soon as possible. H&M representatives are not overly concerned with competition from the already established clothiers on the Polish retail market, such as Zara, Mango and Cubus. “We like competition,” Enhoerning said. “It is good for us, and we do not perceive it as a threat.” He added that Poland is a very attractive market in terms of retail investment. “In the long term we are talking about 150 stores in about 10 years, which is understandable on such a large market as Poland,” Enhoerning said. “By the end of 2003, we want to open three or four stores in Warsaw and in the Warsaw area.” Read more in this week’s Lokale Immobilia.