According to a report by Pressetext Austria there is quite an intriguing development going on in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), which was identified by the GFK Austria experts for Eastern Europe: According to their observations, Eastern Europe is rapidly adopting the consumption behaviour of Western European countries. At least this is the opinion voiced by the experts on the occasion of the 5th CEE market research conference by FESSEL-GfK. »The first stage of a prosperity consumption process is approaching its end. A new individual lifestyle dimension will follow now«, assumes Eike Wenzel, editor in chief of the Horx future research institute. In particular in the fields of fashion and electronics articles there was still a backlog demand. According to Mr. Wenzel it was important for business to carry out a smooth switch from products off the peg to lifestyle articles in order to please the consumers of Eastern Europe for whom quality products are quite important.
This development provides SMEs in Western Europe working in the branches of distribution and others with an ever growing opportunity to export to the East European market instead of competing with low-price imports from this region on their home markets. Time has come for an optimisation of the distributional network in CEE, says Agnieszka Sora, managing director of GfK Polonia. 