First Danish Discounter Normal Opens in Prague — Shoppers Queue for Hours

The first Czech branch of Danish discount chain Normal has opened at the Flora shopping centre in Prague's Žižkov district. According to a member of the centre's security staff, the queue to get in had already been going for more than three hours and showed no sign of shrinking.

The guard said at least a thousand people had visited the store — that's how many gift sets were handed out to new customers, and they had all run out by 3pm. Yet interest didn't fade: by 5pm, the queue was estimated at around 50 metres, with security staff directing visitors into a specially cordoned-off corridor.

Young shoppers heard about it on social media

Young people made up the bulk of the crowd. Twenty-six-year-old Karen came on the recommendation of friends in Slovakia, where the first Normal store opened in Bratislava in late May. "The girls in Slovakia said there are loads of great discounts there, and above all the range is bigger than in other shops," she said. She found out about the Flora opening through Instagram.

Sixteen-year-old Dorota heard about the chain via TikTok. "I thought it looked cool, because I also like Tiger [the Danish discounter Flying Tiger — ed.], which works in a similar way," she said, adding that she'd waited in line for about 20 minutes.

Twenty-one-year-old Agata came with her boyfriend. "I found out about it on Instagram — the ads were popping up everywhere, and I thought, this is definitely worth checking out," she said. According to her, the couple waited in the queue for about ten minutes.

Maze-like stores with no seasonal sales

Normal deliberately avoids seasonal sales and loyalty cards. A hallmark of its shops is their maze-like layout: customers have to walk through the entire range of products before reaching the exit. Part of the assortment is refreshed every week.

The chain's first store opened in Silkeborg, Denmark, in 2013. Today the company, part of Heartland Group, runs more than a thousand stores across 12 European countries.

Czechia is also home to another Danish discounter, Flying Tiger, the German chain KiK, Poland's Pepco, and, since 2020, the Dutch chain Action.

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Around Prague, based on reporting by novinky.cz