Marketing

While it dramatically changed everyone's lives, the epidemic postponed or completely canceled some of the business' plans, while others  it drew nearer in time by at least 1-2 years. Consumers in Bulgaria, those who got stuck in the time around the beginning of the transition, abruptly recalled what it was like to wait in line for food, with the difference that now food is not in short supply.

The regional health inspectorates, Food Agency and Interior Ministry teams will raid on big retail chains stores to prevent queuing in front of stores and crowding inside them.

Customers will re-order online and collect their items outside the stores

As expected, the government on Friday announced the opening of some retailers, albeit in what has been described as a hybrid form to pose the least possible threat to health.

Retail trade throughout the country remains suspended

Unlike Greek courier companies, which are struggling with an overload of orders, local supermarkets have successfully responded to the challenge of home deliveries and increased their clientele by expanding their services this year.

With retail experiencing its second lockdown in a year, representatives of big chains and smaller businesses alike are insisting that stores must open as soon as possible with strict measures in place, as courier companies and e-shops are finding it increasingly difficult to meet the increased demand.

The pandemic has accelerated corporate evolution, with the sale of products directly from the producer to the consumer - hitherto restricted to the primary sector - now infiltrating the consumer goods industry as well.

"Smart lockers" is the business idea that local startup Freshlime has successfully floated into a new network for distributing online orders.

The new consumer habits the pandemic has created are here to stay, at least for most of the consumers who are picking them up during lockdown.

Some of the habits originally expected to be adopted within three years by a large part of the population, such as buying groceries online, were in fact adopted within a few days and now are considered routine for many Greeks.