Nakumatt ‘Temporarily’ Closes its TRM Branch

Nakumatt supermarkets’ Thika Road Mall (TRM) branch has been “temporary” closed by the retail chain.

This move comes barely a month after it shut down its outlet at the NextGen Mall along Mombasa Road which had only been in operation for nine months only.

The branch posted a notice suggesting that it will be closed temporarily due to a stock exchange exercise.

“The branch will be temporarily closed due to a stock-taking exercise thank you for your patronage and apologize for any inconvenience caused,” read the notice from management.

Residents have been asked to visit other Nakumatt stores nearby namely, Ridgeways, Garden City, and Wendani.

The store, which is the mall’s anchor tenant, was opened in 2013 and was the first mega shopping complex along the Thika superhighway.

It targeted customers from the budding Roysambu, Zimmerman, Githurai, Kasarani, Kahawa, and Ruaraka neighborhoods.

Covering a shopping floor space of 80,000 square feet, the TRM branch was Nakumatt’s 39^th store in East Africa at the time of its opening.

Nakumatt has continually been closing down some of its outlets in a move to cut down on costs and huge debts owed to suppliers that were estimated to be at 15 billion shillings as at February 2015, a situation that has been piling pressure on its operations.

The company in May announced plans to close its poorly performing branches in Kenya and Uganda as part of cost-cutting measures aimed at saving the retailer Sh1.5 billion annually.

The first store to be shut down as the Haile Selassie Branch located at the Kenyatta University Plaza, Nairobi, which was closed in May and the premises handed back to the university, which is the landlord.