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The three Fnac stores in Athens, the joint-venture of which included the Greek company Marinopulos and the French Ρinault-Ρrintempts-Redoute (ΡΡR) are closed. The chain of multimedia, technological and electronic products has made losses for € 20 million in Greece, and two of the three stores will be under the control of its biggest competitor Ρublic.

The constant increase in financial losses and the decision of the parent company to get rid of investments in which it participates with other companies are the reasons that led the French FNAC to take the final decision to withdraw from the Greek market. Greek affiliate informed the 200 employees that the stores in Athens will cease to function on July 31.

After 4.5 years on the Greek market the chain stores for multimedia and culture, in which  the French FNAC had 51% and the Greek Marinopulos held 49%, failed to gain profits, according to the ICAP, and at the end of 2009 accounted losses of € 20.05 million. The main reasons for the withdrawal from the Greek market are the financial damage in combination with the macroeconomic environment in Greece and the reluctance of the French company to invest in a firm it does not fully control.

Both stores of FNAC in The Mall-Marousi and in the Athens district Glyfada will be  transferred under the control of Public. The new owners will buy the goods from the two stores and will most likely keep the jobs of the employees. With this new investment Public will have nine stores in Greece and Cyprus and the famous chain enters two neighborhoods of Athens with a strong commercial traffic. The third FNAC store of Monastiraki, which opened in November the previous year and in which the owners have invested € 3.5 million, is expected to close as the central store of Public is nearby.

”With two new stores in Τhe Μall Αthens and in Glyfada and the other two stores on Syntagma and in Piraeus we already geographically cover most of Attica having stores in many central locations in each region,” said Ρublic’s General Manager Robbie Burlas. It is expected the new store of the chain to open in September. It will be in Thessaloniki on Tsimishi Blvd, near the Aristotelus Square. “We found that there is no prospect of development of the Fnac brand in Greece mainly because of the economic crisis,” said the General Manager of Marinopulos Jerome Lumber. “We studied all the possibilities, but we concluded that there is no better alternative. However we will try to keep as many jobs as possible by transferring the employees to other firms of the company” added Mr. Lumber.

This incident caused serious concern among owners of electronics companies, who fear that this is the first lock on the market and claim that it will not be the last. The market of electronics and electrical appliances is much influenced by the economic crisis and we are on the verge of a price war, which will break between the main players.

To note that the General Manager of Fnac for Greece Jacques Brol said half a year ago that the company plans to open between 8 and 10 stores by the end of 2012 and to invest € 25-30 million in them. The change of strategy is due to the economic crisis and the heads of the multinational Fnac decided to limit losses and to target only the expansion of the chain through franchise.