This column first appeared in Malta Today

For some mysterious reason, everyone and their brother seems to think that the best business venture at the moment is to open a supermarket. There are supermarkets everywhere you look, with some new ones opening right next door to existing ones.

So let’s have a fun trivia quiz. Let me ask you to stop reading right here and offhand…just try to guess how many major supermarkets there are. You get extra points if you can name all the locations.

The Lidl chain has 9 stores in Malta and 1 in Gozo.
Locations: Santa Venera, San Gwann, Luqa, Safi, Qormi, Mosta, Zejtun, Burmarrad, Sliema and Victoria, Gozo.

The Scotts chain has 5 supermarkets.
Locations: Attard, Naxxar, Santa Lucia, Zabbar, Fleur-de-Lys

Greens – 3 stores
Locations: Swieqi, Imriehel and Victoria, Gozo.

Arkadia – 4 stores
Locations: Valletta, Naxxar, St Julian’s and Victoria, Gozo

Interspar – 9 stores
Locations: Hamrun, The Point, Sliema, Paceville, Bugibba, Marsaxlokk, Siggiewi, St Paul’s Bay, Sliema, Ta’ Xbiex

Wellbees – 10 stores

Locations: Balluta , Mellieħa , Naxxar, Paceville. Sliema, Qawra, Spinola , Santa Venera, Campus Hub, Shoreline

Miracle foods – 19 stores
Attard, Birkirkara, Birzebbuga, Bugibba, Gozo, Gzira, Marsaskala, Mellieha, Mosta, Naxxar, Qormi, San Gwann, Sliema, Swieqi, Tarxien, Xghajra, Zabbar, Zejtun and Zurrieq

Then there are the big guns which are so sprawling they probably don’t need to expand to any further locations:
Pavi in Qormi
Pama in Mosta

Meanwhile there are the supermarkets which have stuck to one or two locations:
Losco – Zejtun Smart – Birkirkara
Carters – Tarxien
Piscopo’s Cash & Carry – St Paul’s Bay
Iceland – B’kara, Qawra
Chain – Fgura, Zabbar
Eurospin – Mosta

And while it is not a supermarket per se, the Convenience shop does carry most basic goods, and has a whopping 87 outlets spread throughout Malta and Gozo. Obviously I’m not going to list them all but it is safe to say that they have everywhere pretty much covered with several of the larger towns having more than one in order to cater for the various neighbourhoods on opposite sides of the locality.

Likewise Maypole, which started out as basically a bakery but today carries a lot of grocery items, has now branched out into 19 different outlets.

I’ve tried to mention all the major ones, so if I left any one out, a thousand apologies. But the sheer number even as I was researching this issue has left me astounded. I knew there were a lot, but seeing them all listed like this reinforces just what a disproportionate amount there are.

So after all this, you would think that there are more than enough places to buy food and that we don’t need any more, right? (Cue buzzer) Wrong!

The latest development to be proposed will, if approved, replace Gutenberg Press in Santa Lucia and will include a supermarket, several retail shops, offices and catering establishments. Yet as the public immediately pointed out, there’s an existing supermarket, namely Scotts, already there.

Some are quick to say that building supermarkets in the same vicinity “is what happens abroad too” but apart from the fact that they actually have the space for them, the size of our population surely cannot justify the sheer number of supermarkets all vying for the custom of a tiny island. Just how many groceries can one family buy after all? And if you are doing your weekly shopping from one, you are hardly going to go spend the same amount at their competitor the next day. And let’s not forget that, with every supermarket that opens, that’s another small grocery shop which will find it even more difficult to compete. And as these small shops roll down their shutters for the very last time it is the people who for some reason cannot or do not want to go to a large supermarket who will be affected, especially the elderly. It is true that online grocery shopping is ready available (and I have personally continued using this method even after the pandemic), but that means the consumer needs to be tech savvy or else have someone do it for them.

The other quite obvious question is, what is really behind all these new supermarkets? How can they all possibly be financially viable when they are all jostling against each other for the same customers? It is very difficult not to assume that something else is lurking behind this fascination with selling parma ham, yoghurt and baguettes.

Similarly, shopping malls have also been another nail in the coffin for small shops/boutiques. If we take Mosta as an example, the small enterprises are usually buzzing on 13 December, the public holiday, as well as on the weekend before Christmas and of course, on Christmas Eve for those who have left it to the last minute. Instead, this festive season the town was dead, and barely anyone was shopping, while some places didn’t even bother to open. Others have since closed down. Of course this could also be because of the roadworks which took too long to be finished and the decision to reduce parking spaces. The decrease in foot traffic was keenly felt at what should be their busiest time of the year and it was certainly a blow to their projected sales. No wonder the “winter” sales have continued well into spring as owners keep slashing their prices in a hope to bring back some business and salvage what they can.

Yet Pama shopping village, the Plaza, the Point and Centre parc are always jam-packed with people. And the same is being said for the two new shopping malls on the block – Mercury Towers and Shoreline. I can understand the attraction; in most cases, you have ample parking and then have a number of shops to browse through all in one space, along with eating establishments for when you get hungry after all that shopping. For a lot of Maltese people who do not have other hobbies or interests, going to the mall has become a “ħarġa” (an outing) especially on Sundays, for wont of anything else to do. In this sense we have become like many major towns and cities across the globe. The downside on the local level is that all these shopping malls just replicate the same brands so when you have been to one, you’ve been to them all. When it comes to clothes there is nothing unique or especially original (which is why I personally prefer small one-off boutiques found in our towns and villages) and the top it all off, the prices are often eye-watering.

It’s no wonder so many prefer to shop from abroad either when they travel or online, where they can get the same brand at a much lower price. I realise the economies of scale plus shipping costs and overheads are a major hinderance to these retail shops but that is why it makes it even more mystifying why more shopping malls keep opening.

I have one last question, how many workers will need to be employed from other countries in order to sustain the labour force needed for this explosion of supermarkets and shopping malls?

Maybe that should be the topic of the next quiz…