SUPERVALU IS HAVING LUCK WITH LUX

ELLIOT ZWIEBACH

MOSCOW -- Supervalu is moving up in Russian retailing circles.

Minneapolis-based Supervalu, the largest grocery wholesaler in the United States, has been supplying groceries to LUX Market here since mid-1992. Now its fame has spread south to Novosibirsk, where an entrepreneur planning to open a supermarket there is negotiating with Supervalu to supply his store when it opens later in 1994.

Additionally, the owners of LUX are contemplating a second unit here that will extend Supervalu's Russian presence even further.

Every month since the first LUX opened, Supervalu has been sending a container of products to the store here from its distribution center in Atlanta. Included in each shipment are nonperishable groceries, health and beauty care items and some household products.

Indeed, brooms and other cleaning products have been "a huge success" with LUX shoppers, Rita Simmer, Supervalu's director of public relations, told SN Global. "There aren't a lot of that kind of product available in Russian stores."

More problematic has been the dry breakfast cereal category, Simmer said. "Moscow consumers aren't quite sure what to do with it because the milk there is so unpalatable that they couldn't fathom the idea of putting it in cereal.

"But many of them seem to like eating the cereal without milk."

LUX Market, a conventional store, is owned by UNEX, a Moscow-based international trading company that operates offices in the United States and was familiar with Supervalu.

LUX is on the second floor of a building that once was the cafeteria during the 1980 Summer Olympics.

The ground floor features retail shops owned by UNEX.

The LUX store was designed with Supervalu's assistance. The distributor also advised management on the item selection and pricing and sent a team of people to help train store personnel when it opened in August 1992.

Supervalu also helps LUX obtain perishables from France and other western European countries.

The store is 13,600 square feet and is larger than most other self-service supermarkets in Russia. It carries 3,000 stockkeeping units and features point-of-sale scanners at its five checkouts.