Turkish fashion brand Koton opened the newest concept store in Bucharest’s historical center on Friday night. The Turkish retailer invested EUR 6.5 M in a 1,850 square metres freshly revamped location, stretching on 5 floors, right on famous historical street of Lipscani (43 Lipscani st).
The event was attended by Turkey’s ambassador to Romania, H.E. Osman Koray Ertaş, who praised the good commercial bilateral ties.
“I won’t preach about Romanian-Turkish relations being so strong. But you see here very concrete examples and I am so happy that we are having an opening of a Turkish brand, Koton, in the center of Bucharest, on old Lipsani street.
Koton is one of our flagship brands, operating in about 30 countries around the world. And we are becoming more and more popular in Romania.
I am grateful because the store will be hosted in a beautiful building in the Bucharest’s old center.
I would like to congratulate the staff here, the general manager in Romania, with his energetic spirit which will be seen in the brand, he is a relatively young ambassador of Turkey.
With their support our team will manage to further expand our wonderful relations. Good luck,” said the Turkish ambassador.
The commercial attaché of the Turkish embassy in Bucharest, Mukerrem Aksoy, underlined that the success of the Koton brand is that it is customer and technology oriented and has unlimited design ideas.
Cristina Chiriac, founder of the National Association of Entrepreneurship, European Commission ambassador of Woman Entrepreneurship, also attending the opening event, pointed out that such initiative is an example for Romania.
“Koton has been in Romania since 2007, reaching 16 stores and creating over 400 jobs. EUR 6.5 M were invested in this new store. Besides the economic, national context, it proves that Romania is highly regarded, a good place for developing investments.
I am happy that Koton chose to open a new store in Bucharest’s old center, as the building is an historical one and has a special meaning, as some tens year ago this building used to host a famous underwear store.
So, here we are, history repeating.
From now on you can come in the old center not only for the famous leisure nights, but you will be also able to walk on the famous Lipscani street and to shop at Koton for affordable prices.
I am waiting for you to reach 25 stores and to mark a turnover of over EUR 30 billion and to prove that Romania is a place where our economies have chances to grow,” Cristina Chiriac said.
In his turn, General manager Koton Romania, Burak Akbulat, talked about a new start with this concept store, with the team putting a lot of effort in it.
“All the paints, the glues are talking about a new start, we put a lot of effort. I am confident that our customers will love the shop here. On a short view, the store is 1,850 sqm with five floors, three of them dedicated to shopping experience and the we plan to use the rest for the headquarters starting next month,” Burak Akbulat mentioned.
“We consider that this store is integrated in the Romanian market’s approach in terms of presence in the most important locations for community. Bucharest’s Old Center is an area where our customers spend their spare time and enjoy an authentic place and cultural events. We would like to be closer to them, right there, where they are having a good time and leisure, and this is the reason for choosing this location“, Burak Akbulat concluded.
The latest collections were signed by the team supervised by Richard Isham Sardouk, creation manager of Koton since October 2015.
The cocktail event marking the store opening and where the dress code was elegant black ended with a gracious concert by Amadeus, the female quartet, consisting four girls, playing electric instruments and combining pop-dance rhythms with the virtuosity of violins, cello and keyboards.
The Turkish brand Koton is thus the third world fashion retailer, after Adidas and H&M, that enters Bucharest’s historical center, an area still dominated by bars, cafes and restaurants. Koton has bought the location on Lipscani from an Irish businessman for EUR 4.5M.