Burger King, the world’s second-biggest hamburger chain, said Friday that it planned to open its first Russian restaurant in Moscow this year.
“We are still under negotiations with different parties. We are hoping to open soon. The plan is to open by the end of this calendar year,” spokeswoman Andrea Ungereit-Hantl said.
Bigger rival McDonald’s will celebrate the 20th anniversary of the opening of its first Russian restaurant next year, but the country still does not have many foreign fast-food chains.
Ungereit-Hantl said Burger King was looking to cooperate with multiple franchise partners in Russia but would not say how many restaurants that the company aimed to open.
“It’s an interesting market. It’s a big country. It’s attractive and developing. It’s the country where Burger King should be,” she said.
McDonald’s, which has about 300 restaurants in Russia, saw sales here rise 20 percent in 2008 and has said it expected the country to remain its fastest-growing market despite the economic crisis.
In September, Burger King categorically denied a report in Kommersant that it had signed a franchising deal with Mikhail Bazhenov, a co-owner of St. Petersburg-based Adamant Holdings.
The company said at the time that it was seeking multiple franchise partners.
The U.S.-based fast food giant, which operates more than 11,900 restaurants globally, has been focusing on putting the necessary infrastructure in place over the past several months and has recruited local development managers in Moscow and other major Russian cities.
(Reuters, MT)