If you want to know what will happen in retail trade in a year or two, take a look at what’s
going on in gastronomy at the moment.
Let’s go back a few years, to the times when Asian and Italian cuisine, sushi and burgers
were booming. How many people out of 100 had their very first burger or sushi in an outlet,
and how may at home? Similarly – how many people drank their first Pilsner Urquell or
Aperol Spritz in a pub, restaurant, and how may at home? I bet that out of 100, 97-98
experienced that for the first time in a gastronomic venue, and only then took it home to
share with friends and family. If you want to know what people will eat and drink at home in a
year or two, go to a gastronomic outlet and check what’s currently most popular on the
tables and in the bar. Gastronomy builds and creates habits and experiences, which we
often incorporate in our lives for ever.
Nowadays, the industry is going through some hard times. Challenged by the lockdowns
during the pandemic, the Polish Deal, soaring inflation and staff shortages; because if
people have to give something up, it will be entertainment outside of their homes. Following
the lockdowns, we had to rebuild beer stocks from scratch in approximately 17,000 outlets.
Many restaurants, especially premium ones, had to reinvent themselves and focus on
different customers. In large metropolises, like Warsaw, Kraków, Gdańsk or Wrocław, the
HoReCa sector got the traffic back, but smaller cities never bounced back to the pre-
pandemic level. I believe that this market will be recovering for another 2-3 years, and it is
hard to say now what other challenges might emerge over that time.
From the perspective of Warsaw – for many centrally located restaurants, a vast majority of
revenue was generated by lunches and dinners for corporate employees, wealthy organized
groups and other professional groups. Today, these people most work remotely and do not
feel the need to go out. There are almost no foreign tourists who visit Poland for one or two
weeks. The gastronomic business is currently based on individual customers. On the other
hand, Warsaw-based individual customers living in the district of Kabaty, Urysnów or
Mokotów, where there are outlets too, when given the choice – take a tram or uber to the
centre or eat and drink close to home – will eat in a nearby venue.
Before the pandemic, the city centre was driving the traffic, more specifically clubs,
restaurants and popular hotspots. Everyone was going downtown. At the moment,
entertainment attracts people to the suburbs. That’s where we have been observing
impressive venue growth. In newly built residential complexes, besides a mandatory local
grocery store, more and more gastronomic venues pop up, offering burgers, stakes or pizza.
If you want to eat well and have good beer, there is no need to go to the city centre any
more. Previously, we had been focused on crowded outlets, but now we have to change our
way of thinking and realize that it is not all about the centres of Warsaw, Kraków, Gdańsk or
Sopot, because people feel the need to go out locally. And since there is no business or
tourists, who were generating downtown traffic before, the playing field has evened out a bit.
What is also developing – as a post-lockdown phenomenon – are typically outdoor venues,
for example by a river, in the mountains or at a lake, where the traffic used to be seasonal or
where there were no gastronomic outlets at all. We supported our partners, providing
equipment and infrastructure necessary to launch a venue. These places often grew from
low volume to high volume, contrary to the big city, centrally located spots, which recorded
even 80% revenue drops in the worst moments of 2020 and 2021. Meanwhile small
businesses surrounded by nature, somewhere by a river or lake, started growing
significantly. Poles still enjoy being outdoors; in a forest, riverside, boulevard, lake or
mountain trails. The venues there offer lower prices, because their expenses are lower. We
will follow other trends with our offer and skilfully allocate our development powers.
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