While foreign brands plan to enter the Ukrainian market, retailers are focused on domestic manufacturers.

Despite the ongoing war, new global brands are entering the Ukrainian market. In April, Inditex brand stores (Zara, Stradivarius, Bershka, etc.) reopened, and Sinsay has been operating since the end of last year. Also, head of the Association of Retailers of Ukraine, Andriy Zhuk, said that the Polish company Greenpoint, a clothing and footwear retailer, is planning to enter the Ukrainian market.

However, brands returning to the Ukrainian market, such as H&M and the Inditex family, have not yet fully recovered. For example, the H&M chain only opened its stores in Lviv and Kyiv last fall but has not yet returned to Odesa and Kharkiv, where it operated in 2021.

Zhuk also noted that the blocked Polish border creates several risks for Ukrainian companies. The biggest among them is the unpredictability of delivery times. This forces retailers to focus on domestic manufacturers.

“This is a very cool chance for local producers to get on the shelves of our supermarkets. This applies not only to food products but also to non-food products,” he added.