Biggest Uniqlo clothing shop in Asia opens in Shanghai

SHANGHAI, Dec. 9 Kyodo

Major Japanese casual clothing retail chain Fast Retailing Co. opened a Uniqlo brand shop at a Shanghai shopping mall Saturday as its biggest outlet in Asia.

The store with floor space of 2,200 square meters is the second-largest Uniqlo shop in the world after the 3,300-sq.-meter outlet that opened last month in New York's Soho district.

''Shanghai is an important city for the global apparel industry,'' Fast Retailing President Tadashi Yanai said at the opening ceremony. ''Success in Shanghai will help lead us to become a global brand.''

The new shop will serve as a flagship store in Shanghai, displaying 550 items, 30 percent more than the corresponding number at usual Uniqlo stores.

Including the new store, there are seven Uniqlo shops in Shanghai. Another Uniqlo shop in China is in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province.

The prices of Uniqlo products sold in China have been set at the same levels as those in Japan. A down jacket, for example, sells for 500 yuan (7,500 yen) -- roughly three times the price of a similar product at ordinary Chinese stores.

Fast Retailing officials said the company wants to expand sales in Shanghai where personal income levels are higher than in other Chinese cities.

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