Sep 22, 2013
InterAksyon.com means BUSINESS MANILA – The Villar group is expanding its retail operations, the latest of which is All Homes, a one-stop shop for home furnishings that will complement its housing business. Manuel B. Villar, chairman of MBV Retail Holdings Corp, told reporters over the weekend that the company will have a network of five All Homes stores by yearend in Antipolo, Muntinlupa, Alabang, Pampanga and Bulacan. On Saturday, MBV Retail opened its fourth All Homes outlet in the P1-billion Paseo de Andalusia, Vista Land & Lifescapes’ lifestyle center on a 30,000 square meter property within Camella Andalusia in San Fernando, Pampanga. The first five All Homes outlets have an average size of 3,000 square meters and are mostly located inside malls. The cost for each store is pegged at P60 million. “Next year, we would be opening at least four big ones,” Villar said. These bigger store formats cost P100 million each and have an average size of 10,000 square meters. “Clearly, because we are a housing company, it is very logical for us to go here. We want to go big into retailing as well,” Villar said. The newly incorporated MBV Retail is the holding company for the retail businesses of the former senator. Apart from All Homes, the firm also has convenience store chain All Day and department stores, which will be renamed to feature the “All” brand, under its umbrella. The Villar group is not closing its doors on embarking on new retail formats. The former senator said the group is “open” to venture into the pharmaceutical business but it is “not inclined” to enter the supermarket business, citing tight competition. “We’re beefing up our retail capability. We assigned topnotch senior officers to the company. We will be putting more capital as we move along,” Villar said. MBV Retail has a starting capitalization of P1 billion and this may increase in tranches of P250 million. Eventually, it may take on fresh debt to finance its expansion, he said. “By the end of the year, fully used up na ang P1 billion,” Villar said. Villar’s two listed companies, Starmalls Inc and Vista Land, are also beefing up their respective retail businesses. Starmalls, which develops and operates shopping centers and offices for business process outsourcing firms, will finish the construction of seven malls in Daang Hari, Cebu, Sta. Rosa, Taguig, Davao and Cavite by next year. These will add a gross floor area of 290,000 square meters to its existing 340,000 square meters from five existing malls. Vista Land is also building five strip malls to service its communities in Sucat, Daang Hari Pampanga, Cagayan de Oro and Antipolo. The construction of its sixth Vista Mall in Iloilo will commence in January.
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