Flying Tiger Copenhagen opens 52nd Türkiye store in Aydın, how do brands pick malls?

In an open-air format, a store feels more like a high-street window than a unit on a closed corridor. The format makes strolling and stopping in front of windows easier. For a brand built on gifts and impulse buys, the number of people passing the window is an important variable.

That is not known. The news gives no mall and street split, and the Flying Tiger Copenhagen website lists Türkiye among its markets without a store breakdown. So it would be wrong to conclude from Aydın that the brand only goes into malls. The safest reading is that in this Anatolian city, it chose a mall inside a portfolio.

According to a 2024 report in Ekonomi Gazetesi, a Turkish business daily, the plan covered 110 stores in five years, a 20 million euro investment and 1,000 jobs; the business magazine Capital put the same target at 100 stores. The plan also set a goal of 25 stores by the end of 2025. As of October 2026, the count stands at 52.

It does, but from the opposite direction. For a small domestic chain, the question is whether there is a regional partner in Anatolia who can manage mall relationships, shipments and staff for you. Without one, every new city becomes another branch run from head office.

Capital’s 2024 report mentions more than 4,000 product lines. A range of SKUs that wide means deciding, city by city, which products will sell and which will just sit on the shelf. The mix that sells in Aydın may not match the one that sells in Istanbul.

It raises the need for care. The AYD–Akademetre index shows a 22.9% nominal rise and a 6.5% real decline in August 2026. The till may look busy, but once inflation is stripped out, sales are shrinking. In Anatolia, where space already earns less, that squeeze may be felt faster.

The city comes first, and the mall confirms it. Start by asking whether your target customers live in that city, then ask which mall they go to. The right city with the wrong mall turns into a store that shoppers walk straight past.

An established mall has a traffic history; a new mall offers space and room to negotiate. We weigh a large new project in Istanbul from this angle in our Istanbul Alışveriş Merkezi article.

It can stand out through closeness and service, not price. Preparing school supply lists, personal gift wrapping or products from local makers are areas a large chain cannot easily copy. Here, trust and convenience are what lift the average basket.

A brand that may become a regular stop for families and young people can change the walking route inside the mall. Nearby cafés and toy shops may share in that flow. This shift in the tenant mix becomes a negotiating point when leases come up for renewal.

Include the address, the mall name, opening hours and the main product groups. In an open-air mall, parking and entrance details are also useful to shoppers. Building a separate page for each city improves visibility in local search.

Set the ads to a radius around the mall and to weekend hours. A store-specific code lets you match digital visits to sales at the till. That way you see in numbers which cities digital actually works in.

Pull your own stores’ sales per square metre, average basket size and best-selling product groups. Note who already sells your category in the candidate city. If you have a possible local partner, ask about their storage and shipping capacity.

Yes, it should start before opening. Local search, social media and in-mall communication should be ready for opening week. Our digital marketing agency team builds city-by-city marketing plans like this.

Recognition speeds up trust in a new city. We look at how an old brand moves into the modern channel in the Havilland case.

The store is at Forum Aydın, an open-air shopping mall in the ForumOne portfolio.

Overall data shows lower sales on average; in AYD’s April 2026 data, malls earned TL 15,207 per square metre in Anatolia and TL 21,013 in Istanbul. Results in your own category may differ from this average.

First choose the city where your target customers are, then compare offers from established and new malls in that city. Finding a reliable regional partner reduces the burden of shipping and staffing.