Is Carrefour Taiwan actually losing money?
Whatee? I want to know where you get yer bread, man! Carrefour has GREAT bread! Every bit as good and more than I get anywhere else. Iām staring right now at a toasted black olive ciabatta (NT$33) that will shortly be down my gullet. I have a black rye bread loaf (NT$35) to take home and another one I donāt recall the name of. Its as good bread as Iāve had anywhere, supermarket-speaking. I had some nice bread from some shop in town, but it was NT$400 and kinda meh! Although it WAS sold by a sourpuss German dude, so maybe thatās why he was able to charge 10 times the priceā¦
he may have been sourplus looking but thats to keep himself from LAUGHING real hard at all the money hes making and the fools buying a loaf at 400nt
If you think of their competition here, everyone else is expanding except them.
Everywhere Costco goes customers follow. Ten years ago there were 1 or 2 in Taipei. Now they are in Hsinchu,Taichung, Kaohsiung-also opening one up in Nankan(Taoyuan) in October.
RT Mart has had very strong sales with much larger stores, better selection.
Wellcome has had somewhat of a resurgence in the last few years.
Tesco is gone, Aimai (the old Geant) is just holding on.
Jasonās, Orange Mart and a few other upscale joints are gaining serious market share.
Donāt forget the stranglehold of the traditional market.
How many times have you gone to Carrefour just for the A/C? They canāt expand anymore.
A lot of Carrefour stores donāt have the floor space that RT Mart does.
RT Mart is a local company. Nationalism? maybe.
Most middle class families here hit RT Mart on a regular basis, go to Costco once a month and rely on the trad. market for fruit and veggies. Carrefour doesnāt fit well in that equation.
When they have their headquarters in France and have to ride the wonderful economy in Europe, you have to cut somewhere.
- The Costco local Formula attracts 30% valued buyers - 70% window shoppers (90% when cold and rain)
Iāam having my own Costco in Nankan soon ! - Foreigners donāt go to CF for the A/C. Though, i donāt find the picture i took from the CF in Linkou in which they installed a bench in the book section to let customers ā¦read magazines. (Imagine RT mart adapting to this?)
- RT Mart rejuvenation is the key for success. Iād like to buy shares and assist them with their Business development. I presume they bought the land they are on while CF as I was told - rents their buildings (a reason why theyād like to leave the basement building in Linkou due to extreme rent price )
I donāt think Carrefour is doing too badly. Competition is probably pretty strong in a mature market like Taiwan. Their meat is blah though. RT Mart , Aimai, Carrefour, they are almost the same thing arenāt they.
Maybe RT Mart are willing to go all in and establish bigger stores and purchase the property. Carrefour subsidiary in Taiwan may be wary of making that type of investment.
Carrefourās bread isnāt bad compared most of the bread in Taiwan. There is better bread available at bakeries of course.
Costco created the āreligious experienceā for Taiwanese. Instead of going to Mass they go to the Church of Costco on Sundays! You should see their store in Taichung, itās pretty amazing how much they spent on it.
I think Carrefour is mediocre at best. Yep, it has some nice home brand stuff which I rarely buy, but the rest of the merchandise can be found in any of the other supermarkets.
Plus, I can never find the escalators at Carrefour. They are always hidden behind the mop cupboard in the corner, and seeing as you usually have enter on one floor and leave by another, this presents a problem as I am often reported missing.
Maybe Tesco will come back if Carrefour leaves. Then I can buy a packet of Custard Creams for under 38.000NT.
baberenglish, what you said might hold true for Taipei but thereās the whole rest of Taiwan for them to consider.
[quote=ābaberenglishā]If you think of their competition here, everyone else is expanding except them.
Everywhere Costco goes customers follow. Ten years ago there were 1 or 2 in Taipei. Now they are in Hsinchu,Taichung, Kaohsiung-also opening one up in Nankan(Taoyuan) in October. [/quote]
This is definitely true. They just built one here in Tainan last year, and itās always busy. Itās at the edge of the city though, and not everybody has a card, and itās just not convenient for small purchases.
We have one here and itās in the middle of nowhere. I donāt know anyone who goes there regularly. (bismarck might butā¦ he lives near it!)
These are doing pretty well, but theyāre not uniquitous. I can name the locations of two off the top of my head, and I know this city pretty well. And theyāre both close to each other, too. Wellcomeās also a little expensive here.
[quote]
Tesco is gone, Aimai (the old Geant) is just holding on.
Jasonās, Orange Mart and a few other upscale joints are gaining serious market share.
Donāt forget the stranglehold of the traditional market.[/quote]
I was never here for the Tesco days, but Iād love it if CF dropped out and Tesco came back!
We donāt have any of the upscale joints down here. Not even City Super. Thereās Matsusei but those are in department stores, of which we have ā¦ five in this city, and I think only three of them have a Matsusei. Plus, theyāre expensive. They might be slightly above what youād normally pay up there, but theyāre double what we normally pay here.
Traditional markets are great for fruit and vegies (never go to CF for that) but terrible for meat (way too expensive!). CF meat is good if youāre looking for food to eat that day, otherwise QuanLian is quite a great little supermarket and theyāre ubiquitous. And opening up new shops all over the place, too.
QuanLianās probably CFās biggest competitor down here, but CF has longer opening hours (including a 24H shop) and they sell way more stuff. QuanLianās probably where people head to buy daily needs or the odd thing - they sell just classic supermarket stuff, no furniture or anything - but CFs where you do your big shop.
I canāt see CF going under down here because theyāre the only people who offer what they offer. Nobody existing could step in and fill the gap in the market and theyāre not exactly dying from competition. They might scale down operations in Taipei, but Iād be surprised if that doesnāt coincide with opening more stores down here (thereās at least one area of the city where CF is not exactly convenient to get to) and around the rest of Taiwan.
When I compare the RT Mart and Carrefour in Xindian, they seem to be similarly busy. But I do know that most Taiwanese Iāve spoken to who shop for their families say that RT Mart is a little cheaper than Carrefour, and has fresher produce. Carrefour has a wider range, and more specialty import goods. I suppose it comes down to what the market prefers.
What is this āOrange Martā that some speaks of?
The one in Neihu sandwiched between the two RT Marts and Costco seems to be suffering, however. Their selection is less too. I think CF does fine at the locations where they are not going head to head with so many competitors. Btw, Bu Lai En, which location gets your vote for the unique liquor selection you mentioned before?
Tell me more! Iāve NEVER seen rye boules, four different kinds of handmade ciabatta, or REAL baguettes anywhere but Carrefour. Except maybe for a specialty store way the hell north in Tianmu. And for SURE not for the ānormalā bread prices in Carrefour.
Which bread is better in bakeries?
The one in Neihu sandwiched between the two RT Marts and Costco seems to be suffering, however. Their selection is less too. I think CF does fine at the locations where they are not going head to head with so many competitors. Btw, Bu Lai En, which location gets your vote for the unique liquor selection you mentioned before?[/quote]
Well I meant the Xindian Carrefour, but I have seen those at Zhonghe too. Just not at the smaller ones. It might not look like much to the casual observer, but there really are some quality spirits not available anywhere else that muist be brought in through their unique distribution channels.
Sandy, I think Maison Kayser at Breeze has better bread than Carrefour, and it only costs about 8-10 times as much 
I donāt find anything about Carrefour to be that impressive tbh. Itās a big box store. I shop there because itās the closest grocery to my house and itās convenient that you can buy anything there instead of going to several different smaller stores. At my old apartment I shopped at the Wellcome and went to Carrefour every couple of months for those couple of items that Wellcome didnāt have. CostCo has significantly more items that Iām interested in and I would miss CostCo ALOT.
About the only reason that I go to jasonās is for the Gluten free products. Ridiculously expensive but a nice alternative in a gluten free diet.
Tiger Mountaineer wrote: āThe one in Neihu sandwiched between the two RT Marts and Costco seems to be suffering,ā
Thatās actually why I go there ā easy parking and few crowds.
Thereās a world of difference between the Carrefour I used to shop at in Xindian and the crappy little one here in Linkou. Unfortunately, thereās not even any half-decent bread available in this one. But then the habitants of this crapulous dunghill wouldnāt know a good mouthful of bread if it bit them in the arse.
Thereās been news going around that the Linkou one is planning a big expansion, as it bloody well needs to. But I suppose that must be much less likely now, in light of the parent companyās travails.
Although I curse Carrefour and its appallingly bad management far more than I find any cause to laud it, Iāll still miss it sorely if it goes, since thereās nothing else here in Linkou except a couple of shabby and poorly stocked little Wellcomes.
You mean the one in Linkou is crappier than the one in Xindian?! 
I hate the one in Xindian, for me it is a roofed traditional marketā¦ not too clean, messy, crowded. Of course, the one we used to go was the one in Mingde, Tianmu.
Wasnāt it that the Carrefour in Danhsui closed? I was wondering why they would leave such a populated area.
[quote=āsandmanā][quote=āTheGingerManā]Why would anyone buy bread at Carrefour?
Itās beyond horrid.[/quote]
Whatee? I want to know where you get yer bread, man! Carrefour has GREAT bread! Every bit as good and more than I get anywhere else. Iām staring right now at a toasted black olive ciabatta (NT$33) that will shortly be down my gullet. I have a black rye bread loaf (NT$35) to take home and another one I donāt recall the name of. Its as good bread as Iāve had anywhere, supermarket-speaking. I had some nice bread from some shop in town, but it was NT$400 and kinda meh! Although it WAS sold by a sourpuss German dude, so maybe thatās why he was able to charge 10 times the priceā¦[/quote]
Well, well.
It would appear that I am well thrashed in this thread, due to fine reposte, and
if Sandman is coming out of retirement to have a good go.
I readily admit I have not bought bread at Carrefour in at least four years. So already my opine is verily susceptible. That said, I have lately perused the bakery section in many a jaunt unto the Taizhong-Hsinzhu- Taoyuan county assets. It may well be that such loaf of which you speak has not yet trickled down to us heathen out on the heather. Not seen a fine slice except for maybe some French.
No German, which I simply must .
I buy me bread at two select Taoyuan County locations, of which I am not about to divulge their whereabouts. As i have spent much coin and energy on the proper, yet it is catching on. I really need me own stall.
All that said, I promise to venture forth and give the Carrefour more of a chance.
I usually head straight for the haberdashery, but will soon care to caress the crux of the biscuit.
I worked at Carrefour Danshui right before it closedā¦ the day it closed was the best day of my life. I actually skipped work for the last 2 days just because, what are they going to do, fire me?
I didnāt really have any problem with the superior but thereās a general atmosphere of cheapness. They skimp on everything, pay, benefits, and really do not provide enough workers to meet the needs of the store, so your workload ranges from high to very high. Then they have a crapload of stuff that you gotta remember like the various promotions and especially those ones where you give stickers or whatever for buying x amount (I hate those the most) because its easy to forget to give them out.
I think Carrefour Danshui closed because the building had serious structural problem, the headquarter was there and they had to move too. I donāt know the real reason and they kept it under wraps, as in they would not make a formal announcement until the very last minute. All I knew about it was the supervisor told me not to say anything about possible rumor of that store closing but then it was confirmed a week later that they were going to close because the government made them close due to issue with that building.
So they ended up providing a free bus from tienmu to danshui to bring shoppers from that area over. The store manager talked to those of us who werenāt staying in the company (they transferred their workforce to other stores rather than laying them off) and tried to convince us to stay. I basically said they had to pay a bit more because living in Tienmu is at least 10 times as much as living in Danshui, even though they provided free buses for employees (which lasted 2 months). I was glad I did not stay.
As a result of the closure now Tienmu store is seriously overcrowded. They need to expand, as they seem to have been converting some of their storage spaces into shopping area because they just donāt have the space to have a bigger selection. Danshui actually had good selections because the store was like 10 times bigger than Tienmu store, with about 3 floors of parking above the store (any of which can be converted into shopping area if the need arises). Now with that store closed you can actually see tumbleweed in that area, where it used to be a decent shopping area.
Yes. You are correct. They closed the one in Danshui (Chu-Wei) because the building it occupied was condemmed as unsafe. They had the intention of moving to a more centralized location within Danshui, but that has yet to materialize. If the rumors of this thread are accurate, then itās unlikely that they will invest any capital for a new location here.
After they closed the Danshui branch, I went to the Hsin Bei-Tou branch, but it is really small and crappy with extremely limited selections. Also, the Hsin Bei-Tou branch is on the B1/B2 of an apartment building and the parking garage isnāt standard so my T4 Van canāt park in the garage. :fume:
I now go to the Carrefour in Da-Zhi. Very large with excellent selections of anything I need. I would be sorry to see Carrefour leave.
I have no complains about the Sanxia (or is it already Shulin?) one, they have enough parking as everything is in the basement, selection is good, even the Belgian beers used to be good. I discovered it very late and just because my wife got Carrefour vouchers from her company. But now Iām kind of hooked on their bread as I donāt bake myself anymore. And now I even try out everything that is western and looks better quality and is priced fairly, I must say they have a good range.