Euromonitor International is pleased to once again partner with Retail Asia as the official information provider for the 15th edition of the Retail AsiaPacific Top 500 rankings.
In 2017, the leading 500 retailers in Asia-Pacific had sales of US$954 billion, an increase of 1.4%. With regards to overall growth in Asia-Pacific, India had the second fastest growth in store-based retailing in 2017. But it’s a highly fragmented market so the leading retailers struggle to make the top of the rankings.
Despite a sluggish economy, two South Korean retailers, Shinsegae and GS Holdings, significantly outperformed the industry. Both are benefiting from the rise of single-person households in the country which prefer small-volume, packaged products at lower prices. GS Holdings’ GS 25 brand recently launched a Japanese home-style lunch box with premium side dishes, such as salmon miso BBQ and shrimp fries to cater to single persons for lunch. Shinsegae’s emart24 brand now offers best-selling books and magazines so customers can enjoy reading while they have lunch and beverages in the outlet.
Shinsegae launched South Korea’s first discount grocery store, called No Brand, in 2016 and aggressively increased its store count. The brand sells private label products, including cosmetics, snacks, packaged food and meats, at competitive prices. The quality has been assured owing to Shinsegae’s sterling reputation.
Looking forward to the next five years; there is a lot of opportunity for retailing in Asia-Pacific. Sales that occur in stores are expected to grow by 10% to reach US$4.6 trillion. Digital commerce will grow by 75% to total US$1.1 trillion.
Download the Retail Asia-Pacific Top 500 ranking white paper.