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Speaker 1: Ever due for see Ellen thankually.

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Speaker 2: When Nichola willis a supermarket shakeup will make a difference

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Speaker 2: in your weekly shop. Yesterday, of course, she announced a

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Speaker 2: raff of reforms to make it easy for new supermarket

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Speaker 2: players to open and expand across the country, and it

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Speaker 2: was clearly aimed at Costco. Patrick Noon is the former

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Speaker 2: managing director of Costco New Zealand.

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Speaker 1: Hi Patrick, Hi, how are you very well?

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Speaker 2: Thank you? Now Costco was already planning expansion outside of Auckland.

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Speaker 2: So has this actually changed anything?

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Speaker 1: You know? I'm not aware of the Costco current plans.

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Speaker 1: I've been retired for two years now, but I can

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Speaker 1: comment on Before I did retire, Costco was really interested

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Speaker 1: in New Zealand market. It's a great market. There is

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Speaker 1: a lack of competition there and Costco can bring winds

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Speaker 1: and services to the market, add some really really good

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Speaker 1: savings to our members there. And a case in point,

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Speaker 1: you know the West Auckland store in that same preceint

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Speaker 1: we had pack and say we had will Worst across

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Speaker 1: the street and we are able to operate and be

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Speaker 1: extremely competitive to the local market. So yes, New Zealand

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Speaker 1: market is a very attractive proposition. For any food retailer.

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Speaker 1: I would think around the world, why hasn't Costco.

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Speaker 2: If Costco loves it so much, why haven't they actually

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Speaker 2: expanded thus far? Because they had the Wellington plans and

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Speaker 2: they had what appears to have been the Rolliston plans

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Speaker 2: and nothing's actually open.

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Speaker 1: Well I again, I'll just couch it and saying I'm

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Speaker 1: not aware of their current plans. They'll being sort of

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Speaker 1: out touch with the group there. But at the time,

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Speaker 1: you think a new country is a very expensive proposition.

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Speaker 1: It takes a lot of infrastructure in terms of the

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Speaker 1: buying side of it. In terms of at that time,

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Speaker 1: the cost of building in Auckland was very expensive. The

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Speaker 1: cost of dealing with the Auckland Council added layers of

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Speaker 1: cost to the whole project. So it's a very expensive cost.

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Speaker 1: So you have to have a return on your investment.

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Speaker 1: So one COSTO at that time was sort of a

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Speaker 1: test to see how it all worked out. The last thing.

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Speaker 1: The other thing about New Zealand is you're an island

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Speaker 1: or two islands, and getting inventory from northm Record, from

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Speaker 1: Asia and from the Australian market took a lot of coordination,

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Speaker 1: so that that also presents some issues as well being

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Speaker 1: in stock all the time.

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Speaker 2: Do you think that it's the game change of Costco,

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Speaker 2: is the game changer that the country is looking for?

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Speaker 1: Oh? I think so. I think. I think Costco just

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Speaker 1: from the merchandising perspective and now that they're working out

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Speaker 1: their kinks we had initially, I think Costco can bring

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Speaker 1: a lot of value to the market for the New

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Speaker 1: Zealand consumers. Absolutely, we're proving that already and in fact

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Speaker 1: that hasn't changed since day we open.

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Speaker 2: Patrick. Thank you for your time. Patrick Noon, former Costco

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Speaker 2: Managing Director of New Zealand.

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Speaker 1: For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to

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Speaker 1: news talks.

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Speaker 2: It'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast

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Speaker 2: on iHeartRadio