Category Archives: Carrefour

Nairobi retail shopping upstarts.

The Nairobi shopping scene has been upended by several new chains that have opened stores in several malls like Two Rivers in the last few months. They include:

  • Carrefour: This franchise has been around for almost three years now, and has replaced Nakumatt, taking up space vacated by the former giant, at several top-end malls like the Junction, Mega and Galleria. They offer new experiences and different retail operations for customers and suppliers.
  • LC Waikiki: Has a large selection of clothes – for men, women, and children – priced quite affordably compared to other stores like Mr. Price and Deacons who, frequent visitors to Johannesburg say, charge double what the same items cost in South Africa.
  • Miniso: Japanese gift shop chain (that’s really Chinese?) looks confusing at the entrance, but inside they have lots of stuff – electronics, travel items, gift items, and you end up spending a lot more time browsing than you expected, and returning many times to purchase other items.
  • Decathlon: Sports shop at the Karen Hub, is well-arranged, with exercise and sports equipment and clothing. It’s perfectly priced for many people who are experimenters and want to buy stuff to try out new sports for themselves and for children. They sell in-house brands like “Kalenji” shoes (a play on “Kalenjin” runners?) that cost a fraction of name brands like Nike and Adidas. They put out all their stock for customers to pick and try, unlike other shops who put one item on display and have the rest in the backroom where clerks have to go and retrieve the right size of an item. They also have self-service check-out counters and their payment options are completely cashless.

Carrefour in Kenya

Majid Al Futtaim had grand plans for the Carrefour franchise in Kenya which they have since accelerated as other supermarket chains have encountered financial difficulties. This was revealed at a media session by Majid Al Futtaim managers at their Two Rivers Mall office,  located at their second hypermarket in Nairobi. The company which is the leading operator of malls in the Middle East and North Africa holds franchises for Carrefour stores in 38 countries, including 14 in Africa.

Their Country Manager for Kenya, Franck Moreau said they had an initial target to open 5 hypermarkets and 10 supermarkets within 5 years but that has all changed now. When Majid Al Futtaim decided to invest in East Africa, back in 2012, local retailers like Nakumatt and Uchumi were doing quite well. The took up a 20-year lease at Two Rivers, opened their first Kenya store at the Hub in May 2016, and in the last two months, they have signed on to replace Nakumatt as the anchor tenant at two large malls in Nairobi – at TRM on Thika Highway and the Junction Mall on Ngong Road. 

They operate decentralized hypermarkets with each store doing its own ordering, deliveries, storage, handling, marketing, maintenance, payments, and human resources all at the store sites. The financial aim is to create value and market share while meeting or exceeding budgets, and going by current trends in e-commerce, they target to have 15% of online sales in the next two years.

Majid Al Futtaim operates 220 stores in 15 countries, serving 200,000 customers a day. They plan to reach at 500 stores in 5 years with the “great moments, every day, for everyone” theme through innovation in customer service, being a great employer, and working with local suppliers as they take the hypermarket store and adapt it for different countries, customers and cultures.

For Kenya, 1,000 unique products items are imported by Carrefour to differentiate the stores from other supermarkets, and 29,000 other items are sourced from 650 Kenyan suppliers that they work with. Moreau said 50% of their customers at Two Rivers are from the neighbouring Ruaka area who come to shop at Carrefour for the quality, fresh, and available range of products for different classes. But he added that one unique Kenyan thing was a distrust of ‘promotions’ (buyers think there is something wrong with the products on sale) and they are the only supermarket chain asking suppliers for to give continuous and permanent promotions.

The conversion of malls stores to fit the Carrefour model takes time and large investments which Moreau  estimated was five times more than what other local retailers spent on their stores and that it will take about nine months to convert the spaces they are taking over at the Junction and TRM  to full completion, by which time they will have over 1,100 employees in Kenya.

EDIT Feb 27, 2018:  Majid Al Futtaim announced plans to open its fifth Carrefour hypermarket in Kenya at Sarit Centre, in Westlands Nairobi, just a few days after Uchumi ended their 30 year lease at Kenya’s iconic mall. The new Carrefour  will be opened in April 2018, initially on the ground floor and will later relocate into a new wing of Sarit Centre that will be completed before the end of the year.

EDIT Mar 29 2019: Majid Al Futtaim, announced the completion of final major refurbishment of its Carrefour stores at Village Market, Junction and Thika Road Mall to meet the retailer’s global standards and shoppers’ expectations.

EDIT: September 2020 Majid Al Futtaim plan to have three Carrefour stores  in the Coast region. In November this year they will open at City Mall in Nyali and at Centre Point Plaza in Diani.  A third store will follow after at Shanzu Mall.