COOP's retail turnover falls to CZK 20.4bn in Jan-Sept 2009

COOP operates consumer cooperatives above all in smaller Czech towns and in the country.

According to Juracka, the nearly 5 percent drop in turnover is no tragedy in times of the economic crisis.
"When I compare it (COOP's turnover drop) with foreign retail chains, I believe the nearly 5 percent fall can, in a way, be considered a success," Juracka said.

According to him, lower turnover was mostly posted by discount cooperative shops this year. In times of the economic crisis and rising unemployment, Czechs have limited their spending and started saving. Therefore, this year is going to be very difficult for entrepreneurs, with analysts predicting retail sales to fall by up to 5 percent.

Seasonally unadjusted retail sales in September dropped by 7.6 percent in September, falling thus for the 12th time in a row and posting the second biggest fall in the past 12 months.

According to Juracka, COOP got ready for the crisis ahead of time. It invested some Kc70m into unifying the image of all cooperative shops under one logo, it launched a common advertising media campaign and equipped more than half of its 3,000 shops with ATM machines.

COOP plans to build a network of around 90 COOP petrol stations. "The project is well prepared and I believe the first filling stations will appear next year," Juracka said.

Last year, COOP raised retail turnover by 5.3 percent on the year to Kc28.6bn. If the COOP had one owner, it would have ranked as the sixth largest retailer in the Czech Republic last year.

The COOP group comprises 57 consumer cooperatives. At end-2009, the group operated 2,938 shops, of which 425 were part of retail chains COOP Tuty, COOP Tip, COOP Terno, COOP Diskont and COOP Stavebniny.