Chinese electronics and home appliances retailer Suning has published a report, stating that the company's net profit for 2011 will realize a year-on-year increase of between 20% and 25%, and it plans to open over 400 new chain stores in 2012.
These new stores will reportedly include those already planned for the Hong Kong and Japanese markets.
Suning said it will implement different development strategies for various markets. For the first-tier markets, the company will continue to follow its flagship store strategy by adding product categories, so as to expand its product range from home appliances to home supplies and household products. Meanwhile, it will enhance the construction of boutique stores by increasing the sales scale of high-end electronics brands like Apple, Sony and Canon; and it will control the development of community stores.
For second- and third-tier markets, the company will make more efforts in development. In provinces like Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Guangdong, Suning will reinforce its logistics service capacity, while developing the county-level and town-level markets. According to the plans, Suning expects to form a certain scale in the development of second- and third-tier markets over the next two years.
The company also revealed that it will invest more in the e-commerce sector in 2012 to optimize customer experiences on its website. To achieve this goal, Suning plans to build a customer experience team of 200 people in the next 12 months.