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Reuters
Published
Oct 10, 2014
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Eataly to open London food hall at Selfridges in 2016

By
Reuters
Published
Oct 10, 2014

MILAN, Italy - Italian upmarket food chain Eataly plans to open its first London food hall in September 2016 in a joint venture with British department store Selfridges, its chief executive said, en route to a planned stock market listing in 2017.

Eataly CEO Luca Baffigo Filangieri announced the proposed Selfridges deal at the Luxury & Finance investor conference organised by the Italian stock exchange on Thursday, outlining the fast-growing company's ambitious expansion plans.


Eataly NYC | Source: Eataly



"I'm very excited about this: we're opening in London in September 2016 at Selfridges on Oxford Street," Baffigo Filangieri said, declining to give further details.

Selfridges would make no immediate comment when contacted by Reuters.

Baffigo Filangieri added that Eataly, founded by Italian entrepreneur Oscar Farinetti, expects to increase sales at a double-digit rate this year to about 350 million euros ($444 million), with earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) climbing to 100-150 million euros by 2017 from about 40-45 million euros at the end of this year.

"But more important than numbers is that we want to list once we're present in all major cities around the world," Baffigo Filangieri said.

Eataly opened a flagship store in Milan in March and aims to boost the revenues its retail business reaps outside of Italy to 70 percent of the total over the next few years.

Baffigo Filangieri said the company plans to open stores in Sao Paolo, Moscow, New York and Seoul next year, the latter through a partnership with Korea's Hyundai department store.

1 US dollar = 0.7888 euro

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