FamilyMart to enter Indonesia, Philippines convenience store sectors
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- Published on Friday, 27 January 2012 00:20
SOUTHEAST ASIA – FamilyMart, Japan’s largest convenience store operator in Southeast Asia, plans to expand into new markets and open 600 new stores in the Philippines and Indonesia by 2015.
The retail giant said that they plan to add 300 stores in each country primarily to reach out to the younger consumer market, as the aging population in Japan slows down company growth.
Younger people “will definitely want the convenience of a convenience store, and there is trust in things from Japan, especially in Indonesia,” said Masaaki Kosaka, FamilyMart’s director of overseas operations.
He declined to divulge the amount of investment FamilyMart is sowing into this latest bout of expansions.
The company is targeting a 20% increase in overseas profit by 2015, with a forecast of 10% gain in income to US$549 million (¥42.1 billion) for fiscal year ending 28 February.
It aims to have about 70% of its stores overseas by 2020 by almost tripling outlets outside Japan to 29,000, compared with 11,000 in its home market.
Last year, FamilyMart earned US$41.6 million (¥3.2 billion) from stores that it operates in Asia outside Japan and under ventures in Thailand and Taiwan; this constituted 7.3% of the retailer’s total operating income.
As of 30 November 2011, FamilyMart hah 8,697 stores in Japan and 10,782 stores under franchise in Taiwan, South Korea, Thailand, China, USA and Vietnam.
Besides FamilyMart, other major Japanese competitors such as Lawson Inc and Seven & I Holdings are tapping into the faster growing Asian countries where the International Monetary Fund (IMF) forecasts a 5.6% growth – double that of Japan’s 2.3% growth target.
IMF data also indicates that the populations in the Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand and Malaysia are set to grow by 6.6% annually, while Japan’s population will probably contract 1.1%.
