Al Othaim, the Saudi wholesaler and supermarket operator, has opened its 23rd supermarket in Egypt. The new store is situated in Helwan, south of Cairo, and has 450m2 of floorspace. Al Othaim actually announced its intention to enter Egypt as far back as 2009, although plans were later shelved. Since announcing in late 2015 its seriousness about investing in Egypt it has executed a punishing schedule of store openings at the rate of one every two and a half weeks. It opened its first two Egyptian stores in mid April 2016. It opened its tenth store in Egypt six months later and passed twenty stores in April 2017.
All of its store network, a mixture of convenience stores and supermarkets, is in the Greater Cairo area. Al Othaim has stated that it intends opening stores further afield in Egypt. The new openings bring Al Othaim store portfolio to 180 stores: 140 supermarkets and hypermarkets, 27 convenience stores, and 13 wholesale outlets in Saudi Arabia on top of the 23 stores in Egypt.
