In 2011, TsentrObuv plans to open 250 new stores

Shoe retailer CenterObuv plans to double its retail network in 2011 by opening 250 new stores. This is the official development strategy that Retailer.RU was told about by the company.

The first five of the planned stores were already opened in January in Moscow, Kemerovo, Tolyatti and Almetyevsk. Now the network operates more than 300 stores, about 100 of which were opened in 2010.

The shoe retailer plans to develop in several regions at once - 44 retail outlets will be opened in Siberia, 43 - in the North-West region, 55 - in the Volga region, 50 - in the Central region, 32 - in the South of Russia, 26 - in the Urals.

 For the opening of new TsentrObuv stores, more than 60 sites have already been approved both in shopping centers and in street-retail format.

"The sites are as close as possible to metro stations, public transport stops and areas of concentration of population (" sleeping "areas), - comments in" TsentrObuv ". - In provincial cities - in the central part of the city, in clothing markets, shopping centers adjacent to market squares, at train stations, bus stations.

The company did not disclose investments in network development. According to Anton Titov, the general director of the Obuv Rossii chain, the opening of a shoe store together with commercial content will cost 7-10 million rubles.

Where the retailer plans to take funds for the development of the network, the company does not say. Earlier, Kommersant reported that TsentrObuv hired Renaissance Capital and Morgan Stanley banks to organize an IPO on the London or Hong Kong exchanges in the fall of 2011. The plans of the shoe network owners, Sergey Lomakin and Artem Khachatryan, to sell their own shares and an additional issue of approximately $ 500 million

According to the Director General of the National Shoe Union of Russia Natalia Demidova, the launch of 250 stores in one year at once is a very sharp breakthrough in development. “Even in pre-crisis times, shoe chains opened 15 stores a year,” says Natalia Demidova. “So, TsentrObuv is taking a very bold step, now announcing such plans.”

The TsentrObuv company was founded in 1992. First, the company was engaged in the wholesale supply of shoes, from 1996, it began to build a chain of stores in Moscow and the Moscow Region, then it entered regional markets. In total, more than 300 CenterObuv stores operate in Russia, of which more than 30 of franchised stores. The company also develops a network of mono-brand shoe stores Centro, which includes about 100 facilities.