Croatian food-to-retail company Agrokor is planning to takeover smaller retail chains and open new stores in Serbia.
In an interview for regional news channel N1, Agrokor's Supervisory Board member, Ljerka Puljic, said that the Serbian market is the most fragmented in the region, but that there is large space for growth. "Serbia has twice the market in respect of Croatia. It has a good chance to start a new investment cycle and to solve the problem of the fall in consumption. Due to low incomes, the market is the least saturated and there is room for growth”, she pointed out.
Another important factor, according to Puljic, is that large retail chains from the EU are still not as present in Serbia as in Croatia.
Puljic claims that there is no danger of cartel behavior by the large retail chains on the Serbian market, which could potentially lead to price fixing. "We are far from the market shares with which it would be possible to do so. With our 15 per cent market share, similar to that of Delhaize, we cannot dictate prices on a market that has a low level of purchasing power. After five years of crisis, the consumer will go where there is the lowest price", she said.
Agrokor is one of the ten most powerful companies in Southeast Europe. Since merging last year with Slovenian retailer Mercator, it covers a market worth more than €7 billion. In Serbia it is one of the two biggest players on the retail market, alongside Belgium's Delhaize.
© 2015 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article written by Branislav Pekic
