Variety Stores in France

PROSPECTS

Ongoing frugal purchasing habits amongst local consumers due to slow economic recovery continues to favour variety stores

Variety stores recorded another impressive performance in 2019 in both outlet and current value growth terms. The channel continued to flourish at the end of the review period, as slow economic recovery resulted in general restrained purchasing power amongst the population with price-sensitive consumers retaining frugal purchasing habits, visiting variety stores that offer a wide range of inexpensive products covering gifts, personal care, tableware, DIY, décor and household items.

Channel still offers room for new entrants

Despite intense competition amongst the main players within variety store, the channel had not reached saturation by the end of the review period and continued to attract new players that wanted to capitalise on the ongoing strong demand from consumers. Danish brand Normal for instance, opened three stores in Ile-de-France in August 2019, offering a range of competitively-priced beauty and personal care products in addition to confectionery and some household items.

Variety stores attempt to differentiate from competition with specialist categories

While many variety stores tend to offer a similar combination of products, they are also known for individual specialist categories, enabling consumers to visit a wide range of retailers in order to find competitive prices on certain items. For instance Stokomani, Action and Centrakor offer a strong range of home furnishings, in addition to apparel in Stokomani’s case, while Hema’s success comes from the sale of office furniture.

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Action retains leadership and opens 500th store in late 2019

Variety stores remained a fairly concentrated competitive landscape led by Action, La Foir’Fouille, Centrakor, Babou and Stokomani in 2019. The retailer continued to aggressively expand its network towards the end of the review period leading to strong value sales growth despite the entry of Flying Tiger Copenhagen which recorded impressive triple-digit growth in outlet and value sales terms since its entry to France in 2016.

Hema and supermarket Franprix collaborate to expand latter’s non-grocery offer

During the second half of 2019, variety store Hema entered into a partnership with supermarket Franprix in order to boost the latter’s offer of non-grocery products. This launch was timed for the start of the new school year with a selection of 250 products that included stationery and water bottles.

Tati set to close majority of stores over early part of forecast period

Following Eram’s transfer of Tati to new owner Gigi (home and garden specialist retailers) towards the end of the review period, due to the variety store’s ongoing financial difficulties, the brand announced that it would be ending its operations in the coming years. 13 stores are scheduled to be permanently closed, 49 outlets will be rebranded under the Gigi banner, while 30 stores are slated to be relaunched under a new brand, leaving another 25 stores needing to be acquired by investors.

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