CR has 4th densest chain of hypermarkets in Europe --analysis

Sweden has the highest figure - 28 hypermarkets per one million inhabitants, while Poland has just eight and Turkey and the Netherlands only three.

"The Czech Republic has a high penetration of hypermarkets. There is a certain space for opening of further supermarkets or discount outlets, though," Lubomir Mechura of Nielsen Czech Republic commented on the data.

There are only ten large supermarkets and 116 smaller supermarkets per one million Czechs, which is less than in many European countries, however.

Austria has 35 large and 396 small supermarkets and Germany has 57 large and 256 small supermarkets, for example.

The network of hypermarkets has already covered most of the Czech Republic´s territory and, according to data of the firm Incoma GfK, nearly 90 percent of the Czech population has a hypermarket nearby.

The expansion of hypermarkets therefore slowed down in the last few years and they are being built in smaller towns.

The number of supermarkets, hypermarkets and discount outlets in the Czech Republic rose from 1,339 in 2009 to 1,386 last year, according to Incoma GfK data.

The number of supermarkets grew by 25 to 500 in 2010, the number of hypermarkets by 10 to 268 and the number of discount outlets by 13 to 618. Last year´s statistics have not yet been published.

At the end of last year, 18 percent of Czech households said they preferred buying food in supermarkets, while a year earlier their share dropped to 15 percent from 17 percent in 2009, according to Incoma GfK data.

The popularity of hypermarkets rose to 44 percent last year from 43 percent in 2010 and the popularity of discount outlets fell to 21 percent from 25 percent in 2010.

"Czech households prefer more frequently to buy food in large supermarkets, though minor supermarkets registered a remarkable increase last year as well," Pavel Cabal of Incoma GfK said.

Author: ČTK
www.ctk.cz