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Press release 16 September 2008

SOK to open third Prisma in St. Petersburg in the spring

SOK will open a new Prisma Superstore in St. Petersburg in the spring of 2009. The approximately 4,000 square metre Prisma Superstore will be located in a new shopping and office centre, Karelia.

The range of products to be offered in the Karelia Prisma supermarket will be accommodated to suit the consumption patterns of residents living locally. The third Prisma in St. Petersburg will be opened on the corner of Moscow Sosse and Dunaiski Prospect streets, in the Moscow residential area.

– This is an excellent location for Prisma because more than 50,000 people live within walking distance of the store and a total of 250,000 people live in the surrounding residential area, says SOK Retail Int. Oy’s Managing Director Vesa Punnonen.

More than 50,000 cars pass by the commercial centre on the Moscow Sosse and Dunaiski Prospect streets daily, and Zvozniy metro station is located only 250 metres from the new store.

In accordance with SOK’s strategy, three to five new Prisma hypermarkets and supermarkets will be opened in St. Petersburg by the end of 2009. In the long term, SOK expects to open 15 to 20 units. Negotiations on new store locations have advanced as planned.

– We are currently conducting negotiations on several sites in different parts of the St. Petersburg area. We are also looking for sites where we could open combinations of a high-class hotel and a supermarket-style Prisma in downtown St. Petersburg.

The first Prisma Superstore of approximately 2,500 square meters was opened by Nevskiy Prospect Street in the downtown area in June.

– The business of the Prisma store located in Hotel Moskva's shopping, business and fitness centre has started well. The Prisma Superstore has attracted more customers than similar stores in Finland on average, says Punnonen.

The second SOK Prisma will be opened at the end of 2008. The Prisma hypermarket of approximately 8,500 square metres will be located in a new shopping centre in Noviy Devitakino, in the Leningrad Oblast in between the roads leading to St. Petersburg and Toksovo.

The Prisma store chain is the hypermarket sector market leader in Finland. SOK already has three hotel projects in St. Petersburg, the first of which, Holiday Club St. Petersburg, was opened in January. Sokos Hotel Olympic Garden was opened in June and Sokos Hotel Vasilievsky will be opened at the end of this year.

Additional information:
Vesa Punnonen, Managing Director, SOK Retail Int. Oy, vesa.punnonen@sok.fi, tel. +358 (0)10 76 82893,
mobile +358 50 370 6471
Antti Sippola, Senior Vice President, business units, SOK, antti.sippola@sok.fi, tel. +358 (0)10 76 82890,
mobile +358 500 364 650

You can download conceptual images of the third Prisma in St. Petersburg from the S Group media service at
mediapalvelu.s-kanava.fi

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