Country of the Malls

Romania met with an exponential development in the business area named high level commerce in the last years.

On a market more than "weak", where the only memorable initiatives were the famous 50 in one stores (Victoria), Unirea and Bucur Obor, everyone expected an explosion sooner or later.

Wise and politically-oriented guys, after intuiting the real estate boom that was going to come, put their hands on entire commercial networks especially in the province where they bought them for less than little money. Others - more "financially" potent - managed with one or many of the former universal stores from the glorious days of communism. Some of these investors kept them for nothing years in a row. They were in an obvious high state of degradation with the owners having the only intention of selling. The luckiest of them managed to raise some money as an effect of their patience. Others invested a lot of money in them and created the basis of a civilised and high-quality commerce.

However, during the last years, once the first effects of the cash & carry phenomenon appeared, Romania seemed a "wonderland" of this area of activity. Step-by-step, great retail international names aggressively entered a market still "hungered" for such investments and still having an enormous absorption potential. Besides the high number of potential clients, Romania also offers the large commercial operators the advantage of some people for which, for the overwhelming majority of them, shopping is some sort of sacred ritual. That is why, as everyone can easily see, the great commercial centres still cannot handle the great number of buyers and the devastating rhythm in which the bag-people come to spend all their economies in a way worthy of a better cause.

The newest and most tenting offer of the market is the mall. American invention, the commercial mega-complex concept with all the facilities included, "built" in such a way that a family with an average income should be able to spend a quiet day inside it, the mall captured the Romanians a little bit harder than expected. After a successful debut, the gates of such a building (ironically or not, built on the structure of a former Ceausescu’s "Hunger Circus") haven’t been attacked in the same manner they used to be in the days when people were going to the Vitan mall in crowds. Maybe the fact that, unlike in the United States, the prices in the shops are usually high above the possibilities of the standard buyer is also a cause of this recoil.

It is a certain fact that, for a period of time with some exceptions in the province, the first mall in Bucharest seemed to be the lonely pioneer. However, lately, especially in the context of the Government’s desperate efforts of convincing the great foreign investors to come to Romania and since Romania’s adherence to the EU become a certain fact, and when any respectable multinational enters a new market before it gets opened, mall construction became of great proportions. There isn’t a week in which one mall corresponding to a neighbourhood is announced. This way, Romania became the "country of the Malls". It is something to appreciate if we think that this means more jobs and money for some families, but it would be impossible to support such a phenomenon if the economical areas with direct production (industry and agriculture especially) don’t develop in the same manner. Otherwise, with all the respect for these necessary (but insufficient) capitalism infusions in Romania, in a country unindustrialized, the shiny shop windows will become museums.