JYSK service with a French smile

On 3 April, JYSK opened the first store in the French-speaking part of Belgium, when customers were welcomed to JYSK Sambreville.

The store was an immediate success.

Outside, a long line of customers waited for CEO & President of JYSK, Jan Bøgh, and the local mayor, Jean-Charles Luperto, to cut the blue ribbon to mark the official opening on Wednesday 3 April.

Inside, Store Manager Claudio Raffione and his team were just as excited about the opportunity to introduce JYSK in the Wallonian part of Belgium.

Claudio has been part of the JYSK family since he started his training in October 2018, and he is very happy that his store will introduce JYSK to the French-speaking part of Belgium.

“Although Belgium is one country, no one in Wallonia knows JYSK, because all of the stores so far have been located in the Flemish-speaking part of Belgium. This also means that we have to tell our customers about who we are, that we are a Danish company and so on,” says Claudio.

And although it can be hard to understand for people outside Belgium, it is almost like opening in a new country because both the culture and the language is different in different parts of the country.

“Here we are much closer to France and the French culture, and we expect that all of our customers will be French-speaking, just like all of the employees are speaking French,” explains Claudio.

The JYSK way

However, JYSK is still JYSK, and according to Claudio the JYSK values live as well in Wallonia as in the rest of Belgium and the world.

“One of the things that I really like about JYSK is that the values are not just something written on a piece of paper, but actually something we live by every day. Therefore I am also very happy to have the opportunity to become part of JYSK, and it has been a great experience so far,“ says Claudio.

Judging from the big turnout for the opening, the new JYSK is a great experience for the customers as well.

Although there were 18 colleagues working on the opening day, everyone was extremely busy making sure that all customers had a good experience despite the queues.

When the store is back to normal, there will be 10 employees in Sambreville, while the rest of the French-speaking colleagues will move on to other stores in the French part of Belgium.

The next store opening in the French part will take place in Liège.