Action opened its first pilot stores in Poland, in October 12 in Leszno and in October 19 in Legnica. In the coming months four new stores will be open in Poland, the locations are: Glogow, Swidnica, Walbrzych and Luban.
“If things turn out OK we’ll turn on the roll-out machine,” said CEO Sander van der Laan for The Financial Telegraph.
Besides Poland Action is operating in such countries as the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, France, Luxemburg, Austria. Of the 2.7 billion euro sales that the chain earnt last year, two thirds come from abroad.
The last annual account of action showed that the retailer also has subsidiaries in Spain and the Czech Republic, but if the company intends to start the Action shops there is still not announced. Action saw its sales grow by 34 percent last year, while profits were almost half higher. An end to growth is not in sight, says Van der Laan. “A commercial company like Action must always grow, we believe there is still a lot of potential for our formula.”
Action is a Dutch discount store-chain. It sells mostly small, low budget, non-food products.
Action was founded by Gerard Deen and Rob Wagemaker, who were later joined by Boris Deen. They opened their first store in 1993 in Enkhuizen and started expanding by founding new stores that same year. In 2002 they had 94 stores, in 2005 the first store was opened in Belgium, in Rijkevorsel, and in 2009 they opened their first store in Germany. Financier 3i bought Action in 2011 from the founders. When buying Action, the chain had 245 stores and 718 million euros. Over five years, sales rose to 2.7 billion. There are 35,000 people working. This year sales exceed 3.5 billion.
In 2014 Action opened its 500th store. It continued growing exponentially. In June 2017 there are already more than 900 stores in Europe.
Source: The Financial Telegraph, retailtrends.nl
Photo: Action twitter