Metro China to open more stores

BEIJING: Membership stores that have targeted affluent urban consumers have kept their expansion plans this year as demand is on the surge for affordable and quality merchandise.

Metro China, a high-end retail subsidiary of Beijing-based Wumart Group, said their scaleup plan is still on track this year both online and offline, following a new store opening in Beijing.

The new store in the Sijiqing area in Haidian district in Beijing is the fourth store in the city, with an area of 7,500 square metres and houses more than 8,000 types of merchandise from 60 countries.

Of them, more than 40 are imported or of private brands.

Health, maternity, cooking and gifting are four major categories the new store is offering.

To keep consumers coming back to the stores, about 20% to 30% of the merchandise in Metro’s membership stores will be replaced with new products every three months, said the company.

“Metro’s global procurement office has imports based on the best origin of products to better meet the members’ needs for high quality,” according to Chen Zhiyu, deputy chief operating officer of Metro China.

Metro’s strengths in operation capacity, procurement scale and quality control have been generated from its years-long experience in providing products for business operators including five-star hotels, international kindergartens and government institutions as well as enterprise clients.

The business-to-business sector has accounted for 30% to 40% of its total revenue, with more than 1,000 employees serving 100,000 enterprise members, said Chen.