Karstadt department stores open up for international retail

• Well-established German retailer transforms into omnichannel organisation
• Karstadt offers its excellent locations, expertise and reputation
• Initial talks at World Retail Congress 2017 in Dubai

Dubai, UAE, March 29, 2017:  Karstadt, a German department store organization, is successfully promoting its transfor-mation into an omnichannel retail platform in Central Europe. After a remarkable turnaround in 2015/2016, the well-established traditional retailer is now opening its retail space to the international market. Foreign offline players as well as pure online-players have the opportunity to profit from Karstadt's expertise and to enter the European market place. Initial talks will take place at the World Retail Congress 2017 in Dubai.

Karstadt’s holding company, Signa Retail, is turning its traditional bricks-and-mortar businesses into omnichannel platforms. The holding company has already acquired and integrated leading pure online players. The next step is to merge physical and digital retail by enabling international partners to take advantage of Karstadt’s excellent locations, reputation, market experience and customer insights. Possible cooperation ranges from leasing out space to operating shops or providing logistical and digital services.

Karstadt CEO Dr. Stephan Fanderl explains: “Karstadt is a multi-category leader with nation-wide availability of retail space and a strong logistics network in Germany, the strongest European economy. We operate a physical assortment base of one million items and know that the human touch is important to the customer in many areas.”