Industry

Two retail giants from UAE listed as world’s top 250 most powerful retailers

By HiDubai Newswire July 06, 2021 1 min read

International consultancy Deloitte’s Global Power of Retailing 2021 has ranked the UAE-based LuLu Group and Majid Al Futtaim Holding among the leading retail brands.

LuLu Group – which operates hypermarkets and superstores across 10 countries – posted $7.4 billion revenues in the financial year ending 2019, achieving a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 5 per cent.

The UAE-headquartered retail giant has 210 stores across GCC, Egypt, India, Indonesia and Malaysia.

While Majid Al Futtaim Holding’s revenues reached $9.57bn, it posted net retail income of $7.65bn with CAGR of 6.5pc in retail revenue, reveals the report.

The list is led by US giants with Wal-Mart Stores at No.1 followed by Amazon, Costco Wholesale Corp., Schwarz Group and The Kroger Co.

The total aggregate retail revenue generated by the top 250 retailers is $4.85 trillion with 4.4pc composite year over year retail revenue growth.

Some of the key impacts of Covid-19 on leading global retailers as per the report are essential versus non-essential retail, reduced demand, enforced store closure and travels bans.

On the other hand, online retailers have benefited from consumers aversion to in-store shopping due to the pandemic.

However, leading retailers were able to capitalise on new consumer opportunities presented by the pandemic, particularly online shopping and delivery and were able to continue trading from their stores.

Since the start of the pandemic, LuLu Group opened 26 new hypermarkets and supermarkets, including four e-commerce fulfilment centres across the region.

“No doubt these are very challenging times and we had to delay our expansion plans last year due to lock-downs and Covid-19 restrictions, but now we are fully back on track to open 30 new hypermarkets and 10 e-commerce fulfilment centres in the GCC, Egypt and the Far East by the end of this year. Dubai Expo 2020 coupled with fast improving health and safety situation is sure to boost the market sentiments sooner than later,” said LuLu Group chairman Yusuffali MA.