By Chris Nicholls
MELBOURNE: JB Hi-Fi and The Good Guys have both opened new stores in the Cranbourne homemaker centre, putting pressure on established rivals Harvey Norman and Betta Electrical.
The Good Guys opened their new store last month, with proprietor Frank Butera saying trading for the first few weeks had been “ok for early days”.
JB Hi-Fi chief executive Richard Uechtritz was more positive, saying the new store, which has only been open for a week and a half, had been “trading well”.
“It’s a good area. We’re right next to The Good Guys, and the combination of us and The Good Guys is probably the most powerful combination you can get in electronics store retailing,” he said.
However, Uechtritz admitted it was “certainly a crowded area”.
The JB Hi-Fi store is approximately 1,300 square metres in size.
Both Butera and Uechtritz also said they saw the recent Sony and Samsung promotions as positive moves, with Butera saying “the Sony Playstations are really going to take off” and Uechtritz suggesting the promotions could tip those considering a TV purchase over the edge.
“They’re certainly offers that are good enough to make the customer consider a purchase if they were umming and ah-ing about it previously,” he said.
Uechtritz also said he expected pre-Olympics sales to beat those from 2004, thanks to the closer time zone enabling prime time viewing.