Stores Instead of factories. From Deindustrialization to Modern Trade - Statistical Analysis of Suceava

Abstract

Abstract

The role of industrialization was to turn Romania from a rather agrarian country into a country with an industrial profile. We can say that the communist period was marked by forced industrialization, which had even created an industrial tradition that characterized the centralized economy of the country. The Romanian retail is currently characterized by an accelerated development, which leads to increased competitiveness, crystallization of modern trade forms, consolidation of modern retail networks and, last but not least, the attainment of attractive profit rates. Today, after the period of the communist regime, characterized by strong industrialization, Suceava has become a powerful trade center. Many malls are located in the place of former factories, which have been left behind or moved out of urban centers. Romanians are doing shopping in over 60 malls today. Most of the modern retail spaces, about 75% of the total, are grouped in Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca, Timisoara, Iasi, Constanta, Craiova and Brasov. In a short time, the area of modern retail space per thousand people became the largest in the country. The paper presents and analyses the transition of Suceava, from a commercial dimension perpetuated since the medieval times until the late nineteenth - early twentieth century to an industrial dimension started, timidly, in the early twentieth century and continued into an advanced form after the Second World War, during the communist regime. The paper also presents the return to a commercial dimension, after the communist regime.