Tumaini to open two new stores in Nairobi

Tumaini Self Service Limited is set to open two new supermarkets in Nairobi this week, which will bring its total number of stores to 12, with eight of these in Nairobi.
Private equity firm Adenia Partners acquired a controlling interest in Tumaini late last year (see our previous story). The new stores will be located on the fringes of the city – on the Eastern Bypass and in Kahawa West. These stores will occupy around 2,300m² and 1,400m², respectively. “Our aim is to be in all the major arteries of Nairobi. We are spending around KES200 million (USD2 million) to set up the two stores,” a company spokesman told the Business Daily newspaper.
The Sagaci View: These store openings represent a continuation of Tumaini’s established strategy of focusing on densely populated areas with significant concentrations of middle- to lower-middle-income consumers.
To date, Tumaini has shied away from opening stores in Nairobi’s central business district or the city’s more affluent suburbs. Competition in these locations has grown increasingly fierce (particularly in the wake of Carrefour’s rapid expansion), but this has not stopped Quickmart, a player similar to Tumaini in many respects, from trying to target more affluent consumers (see our previous story).
For the moment, Tumaini appears content to concentrate its efforts on Nairobi’s rapidly expanding outer suburbs, which remain relatively underserved by modern retail formats. But how long will it be able to resist the lure of the city’s biggest spenders?
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