By Claire Reilly

Costco is busy expanding its Australian network with the big box retailer launching a marketing offensive in the lead up to the opening of its second Melbourne store, located in the north eastern suburb of Ringwood.

The retailer also has plans to open its first store away from the eastern seaboard, beginning the search for a store manager for the recently announced Adelaide warehouse.

First announced in late March, the Adelaide store will be located in the Churchill Centre retail development, developed by Axiom Properties, in Kilburn, north of the Adelaide CBD. Costco is set to build a 14,000 square-metre warehouse in the development, which will also house other big box retailers including Coles and Kmart. The Centre is slated to open in April 2014.

The job advertisement for the Retail Store General Manager for Adelaide, published online last Friday, stipulates that the successful candidate must be able to “manage more than 350 staff members” and have experience managing “a large format retail environment…with a minimum annual sales turnover of $50 million or more”.

Costco is already taking registrations of interest for three new stores under construction, including the Ringwood shopfront, as well as warehouses in Crossroads, Casula in New South Wales, and North Lakes in Queensland.

Interested customers are also able to sign up for membership at the Ringwood store, which is due to open in September, according to the company’s membership office. The warehouse will be located on the corner of Bond Street and Market Street in Ringwood, down the road from the Eastland Shopping Centre, where Costco has established a temporary membership office to sign up new paying members.

In other Costco news, the US retailer announced its global sales for the third quarter late last week, with a 6 per cent increase in comparable sales in the US market for the 12 weeks ended 12 May 2013, and a 4 per cent increase in international sales.

Total net sales across the company increased eight per cent year-on-year, up to US $23.55 billion for the twelve week period, compared to US $21.85 billion for the same period in 2012. Net sales for the first three quarters of the 2013 fiscal year currently stand at US $71.10 billion.

Construction rolls on at Costco’s newest warehouse in Ringwood, Melbourne.