Retailer Carrefour recently signed a franchise contract with supermarket operator Gulliver, under which the first two Gulliver supermarkets in Bucharest have already been re-opened under Carrefour's Express brand. The brand, Carrefour's neighborhood shop type, has affiliated 24 franchised units so far, and runs three others directly.

Gulliver has nine stores in Bucharest in total, and all of them will gradually go under the Express brand, while also keeping the Gulliver name.

Gulliver is among the largest supermarket networks in Romania, and has annual sales of some EUR 6.8 million.

Carrefour made a similar move with another supermarket chain, Angst in 2011, when the French retailer started expanding its Express network via franchise across Romania. The Angst network comprises 24 units and also runs three factories for meat and dairy products, being one of Carrefour's suppliers.

Carrefour runs 24 hypermarkets, 68 supermarkets under the brand Market and 27 proximity shops Express.

editor@romania-insider.com

(photo source: Carrefour)