Media Markt, which is known as the biggest electro-market in Europe, opened its first store of Turkey in Istanbul and encountered a massive demand on the opening day. It is observed that while Media Markt Umraniye Store opened at 08.00 am, the products with in the range of sales campaign ran out at 09.30 am and the store had to be shut down permanently at 11.00 am. It is reported that the payments of the customers inside the store were taken at the shut down time and the transactions took a long time since there were endless queues.
Best selling products were the ones labeled as the half prices: 42” Plasma TV with 1,299 YTL price, and the Fujitsu Siemens laptop with 666 YTL price. It is also reported that some 5,000 TV’s were sold in this small sales madness time. The campaigns were planned to last for 4 days, meaning September 28th dead time, but as the stocks were sold out in just a few hours all the campaigns have lasted. Is the opening of almost sector fluctuating Media Markt signs a new era in “channel-technology market” discussions that were held at least for 2 or 3 years or in other words differentiation in “sales- value added sales”?
Izi Kohen : This Event is a Trigger for Technology Use in Turkey
Channel system of Turkey was built in 90’s and today it’s driven by two enormous distributors, Arena and Index, and creates a very important sales volume in provinces and big cities located all over Anatolia with approximately 8 or 9 thousand subsidiaries.
On the other side we met with the Technology Markets idea in 2000’s. While Teknosa speeded this revolution, this technology stores are attracting great attention, offering interesting prices and promotions to the customers. They are also causing some questions in the channel system with their market shares.
We interviewed Izi Kohen, the Chief Executive Officer of Arena on this topic. Kohen does not see the picture in a negative manner. He even points out that this is a new phase. Kohen remarked that while electro-markets in developed countries have been gaining some market share, subsidiary system has always been holding its position. “We need these processes for the development of technology use in Turkey” said Kohen.
We also asked Kohen about the impressive opening of Media Markt and here is his answer : “It is clear that sector will response. Even Gold and Vatan declared that they will be “the cheapest”. I think that it is very cleaver of Media Markt to advertise itself with cutting down the prices and putting customers money into their own pockets, instead of publishing thousand $ cost ad campaigns. They even may be making a bigger ad this way. It is also beneficial in technology expand. The person that purchased the laptop today, will change his laptop in two years, or purchase a Mouse, or purchase a PC and etc.”
Kohen also points that retailers’ (meaning electro-markets) sales decreased 25% during the election time period while subsidiaries’ sales stayed still. Kohen reasons the subsidiaries which understood that they could not exist only by selling PC and printers and therefore edged towards value added business.
In brief words, the balance is reshaping in Turkey’s computer market, which is expected to hit 3 million computers this year – including 1 million laptop sales- according to Kohen. The business models are changing.
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