By Benard Sanga
Mombasa, Kenya: Footwear trader, City Walk plans to float its shares at Nairobi Stock Exchange to raise requisite capital for its planned expansion to neighbouring countries.
The company also says it plans to open more branches in the country’s main cities in the coming months as it looks to reduce the dominance of Bata in the region’s footware market.
The footware company opened a second branch in Mombasa Wednesday in Sh15 million expansion program at the coastal city. The new shop is located along the Moi Avenue Mombasa.
“So far we have seven branches in Nairobi, two in Mombasa, two in Kisumu and one in Nakuru. But we want to increase the number of the outlets to 20 in the near future,” said Ali Sheriff, City Walk Director in Mombasa.
He said that in the company’s expansion program, it intends to float its shares at the Nairobi burse to enable it to raise capital for the expansion to other East African countries.
Sheriff said that it would open another outlet in Eldoret in the next few weeks and increase outlets in Kisumu and Nakuru.
The new footware wars between City Walk and Bata comes barely a year after Servis Shoe Company exited the Kenyan market after two year of operation.
The Karachi Stock listed, Servis Group ceded its shops to Kwaza shoes, a new entrant in the country’s shoes business market.
According to Sheriff, City Walk was also looking to tie more links with international shoe manufactures.
He ruled out price wars with Bata, which enjoys a near monopoly in East Africa with other 40 branches countrywide, saying City Walk was targeting the middle and upper market.
“Our target is to open more shop like in India where we have over 250 shops. And we see Kenya and East Africa as the ideal place to launch our expansion to other African countries,” said Sheriff.
