Piotr Miączyński, Leszek Kostrzewski: How do you feel as a representative of the Polish economy's last sound driving engine? Economic experts say: the crisis won't touch retail. People have to buy their food and drink.
Ryszard Tomaszewski, head, Tesco Poland: A year ago I went to London to meet my superiors. I showed them what I was preparing for this year: more better-quality products, more ecological and diet foodstuffs, and so on. My boss listened quietly to all this and then asked, 'Ryszard, and how are you preparing for the crisis?'
'For what?' I asked. 'For the crisis.' 'But there won't be any crisis in Poland.' 'Oh yes, there will', I heard. 'It's like trying to stop gravity.' And by summer we had already seen the first signals that people started shopping in a different way.
What do you mean?
They had started choosing cheaper products. During a crisis everyone wants to spend less, people are looking for bargains. When people have less money to spend, the retail sector will feel the impact sooner or later. I'm telling my managers: we're facing a Darwinian year. Only the fittest and most intelligent players will survive, those that are able to adapt to changes quickly. It will very tough. Turnover is unlikely to be increasing, margins won't be growing, while staff wages, even if slowly perhaps but will still be creeping upwards. And costs are growing, and dramatically.
Why?
Power bills alone have been up 30 percent since January. This is going to cost us an extra PLN 30 million this year alone. And that despite the implementation of massive savings programmes. Last year we spent PLN 4 million to install energy-saving lamps, consuming a third less electricity, in all our outlets. Even though the old ones could have worked for another five or seven years. We installed covers on the chill cabinets, movement detectors to control the lights, and so on. And yet we are still paying huge money for electricity.
What are you going to do about this?
We're trying to get the decision makers interested in the issue. Trade organisations and industry representatives are showing the effects of such a rise for the different sectors and for the economy as a whole. A 30-percent rise in a single year? Who'll survive such a hike in costs? The situation is creating a problem not only for companies but also for consumers.
Has the government reacted?
Nothing has happened so far. And without understanding and support from the government things won't get better. We won't close the stores in a sign of protest, after all.
And what would the government be supposed to do? Go to the power companies and tell them to lower their prices?
Let me reply with a question: and what have the successive cabinets done over the last fifteen years to liberalise the energy market? Not much! Why is coal so expensive? The billions pumped into the mining sector have not been well spent. Everything needs to be done to liberalise and demonopolise the energy market. I'd like the energy market to be as competitive as the retail market is. When one chain cuts a price by a few cents, others react immediately. Everyone benefits from this, and most of all the customers.
Costs in the retail sector are growing and margins are falling. Who's going to be hardest hit?
The chains that don't own their premises. There are chains that rent 95 percent of their stores. They pay rent in euros. And the zloty is very weak today. The euro exchange rate will be pulling them down.
Do you mean deli stores?
I don't want to mention any names. But there are companies that have rented expensive locations in shopping centres. They may not survive the loss of 10 or 15 percent of their existing customers.
And what will happened to them?
They'll most likely be taken over by someone else. There's no vacuum on the market in the retail sector. Customers will only notice that the store's name has changed.
Źródło: Gazeta Wyborcza
