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A bygone era is symbolized by the former socialist supermarkets belonging to the old Centrum chain, which at that time were as much a shopping mecca as shopping centers are today. Much of the department stores built during this period now look more like bulky monsters, but there are also valuable architectural works among them. This is especially true for buildings located in the inner areas of Budapest, built earlier. Some of the “squares” of the decades before regime change have now undergone a series of functional changes, while others are quietly disappearing from the public. But what they have in common is that they are still largely urban, often districts or city centers. they dominated national retail trade until the 1990s, but for a long time they were completely relegated to the background compared to modern shopping centers.
“Centrum Áruházak” was the largest department store chain in Hungary alongside Scale in the period before the regime change. For decades, it offered a wide range of products in the main cities of the country at that time.
It may come as a surprise to many, but the origins of the company date back to 1882, with the opening of Hungary’s first department store, “Guttman Jakab”. The next major milestone in the history of the company was the handover of the Paris department store (later called Fashion Hall), which was already followed in 1926 by the Corvin department store.
The national Centrum network has been established
In 1948, the stores that were the cream of retail at the time were nationalized. In Budapest, several of the iconic shopping centers operated in Rákóczi út, which were given new names during the socialist period: Lottery, Competition, Pioneer Store, etc. Then slowly began a process of concentration and entire networks entered the retail segment.
In 1966, as part of this trend, the National Department Store Company was established, which in 1967 took the name Centrum Department Stores. Its better-known members of the capital include the Corvin department store in Blaha Lujza square and the fashion salon in Andrássy út, but in the 1960s the department stores were also built in the countryside under the auspices of Centrum.
This process continued until the first half of the 1980s, when the 8,000-square-meter Centrum Shopping Center in Kecskemét was opened in 1983, which was one of the chain’s largest rural units at the time. The network had about 25 stores around the regime change.
Beautiful advertising masks
Although Centrum Stores was a determining factor of its age in national retail, it needed some publicity. The advertising face of the company in the 1970s was Mariann Szedres. Then, in 1985, the II. The first beauty pageant in Hungary after World War II, in which Tünde Kondász received the Centrum Department Stores public award, the 1-year advertising contract. “After the competition, I received forty thousand guilders. I put it in the bank. The fee received for the centre’s advertisements also migrates to a savings deposit. I do not give it under a house with a garden!” – he said at the time Tünde Kondász.
Western type trade approached the body
But what was the secret of success? According to experts, stores in the middle of the socialist system tried to make western-class retail trade somewhat accessible: they had a wide selection in Hungary, they offered a wide range of products, which was an important word during the scarcity economy, goods iron, fashion clothing, haberdashery and more. a lot of everything else.
In addition to the individual brand stores, they offered a wide range of services, photocopiers and shoe racks, but there were also fast food restaurants on the premises where guests could eat cheaply and to a relatively good standard.
Furthermore, department stores were able to present the product range in a large space, while managers and salesmen practicing the profession at a high level attracted customers to well-furnished stores with high-quality window displays. The focus on the customer has determined the commercial policy of the stores, which seems natural today, but curiously, it was not always like that at that time.
Another novelty was that promotions were introduced and other events were organized on certain days, that is, they set a kind of precedent for the marketing activity of current shopping centers.
The descent begins
Thirty years ago, after the regime change, the privatization of the company began. In 1991 the company was reorganized, which later continued to operate under the name Centrum Áruházak Kft., And later became a public limited company.
In 1997, there was a change of ownership, as Skála Coop Rt., Owned by the German Tengelmann, acquired a majority stake in Centrum Rt. Then, in 1999, the company merged with Skála Divatház, Skála és Centrum Rt.
The next chapter in the chain’s history was when Capital Rt. Acquired Skála Coop Rt. From the Tengelmann Group in 2001. This was followed in 2002 by the appearance of a new image and a name change: Skála Divatház Rt. Starting in 2003, non-compliant stores with poor technical condition and limited space were sold or rented. At that time, many stores closed across the country.
Also, retail sales in Hungary have changed dramatically in the meantime, this was clearly the period of shopping malls, so in 2005 the management decided to sell the stores – all but four were sold at that time (currently the stores operate as units from the Skála chain of stores).
At that time, several stores of the Skála Group, which also passed on the legacy of Centrum Áruházak, entered the interest of the Hungarian capital Rt. That is why this company constantly gets rid of them: First they sold the Paris department stores and closed the Home, and then they got rid of some of their own country stores. 2007 is another important date, when the Buddha Ladder, which was a large department store when it opened and long after, also lowered the blinds after some 30 years of operation, and in 2009 it was demolished. Since then, the Allee Mall has taken its place.
The emergence of shopping malls marked the beginning of the end
After the regime change in Hungary until the mid-1990s, that is, until the second generation of shopping centers appeared (such as Duna Plaza, Pólus Center, etc.), these ex-socialist supermarkets functioned well, since they did not they had competition. But modern shopping centers developed by foreign investors soon left them on the back burner.
Since then, there have been several changes of ownership in the stores that belonged to the Centrum chain, but a significant part of them have changed their profile and are still being renovated: Meanwhile, they managed to find their place in the hierarchy of the national retail market. Centrum and Skála were once the true centers of the larger rural cities and several metropolitan districts, although from the second half of the 1990s modern shopping centers appeared in the countryside in addition to Budapest. Many now perhaps iconic stores have survived the changing times and still receive shoppers today.
Source: Hungarian National Digital Archive, We Love Budapest and Realista.hu
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