Retailer Kiokii and… Inc. is continuing on its aggressive expansion plan across the country.
Recently it opened its 13th store at CF Pacific Centre in Vancouver followed by its 14th store at Masonville Place in London. CF Fairview Mall is the next to open.
The retailer has 28 stores across the country.
CEO/Founder Echo Peng said every new store that has opened has had great success with the brand name getting more exposure and developing many followers.
Peng said a recent job fair attracted hundreds of people who wanted to work for Kiokii.
“90% of the people they are female, and then they know our brand, their passion, and they are loving our social media. They want to work with us, not just because the economy is bad, but also it’s because that they are actually in love with Kiokii brand. I personally think that what we always do is we think that if we have the really, the best products with the reasonable price, comparable price compared with other brands, retail, a good customer service, we are thinking from the customers point of view with a really shopping good environment, then eventually we were getting our customer as a loyal customers,” said Peng.
“I think by the end of the year, we pretty much covered all the tier one malls. Yeah. So the only ones that we haven’t covered, I think it’s really like Yorkdale,” she said.
As the company continues its expansion, it is looking for space between 2,500 square feet and 3,500 square feet.
Peng said the company wants to open at least 50 stores in Canada by next year.
Scaling at this pace can be challenging, but Peng said the brand has a great team. The payroll has gone from about 120 at the end of 2023 which has grown to about 240 at the end of 2024. Today, it’s close to 300.
Its head office is in Vancouver with warehouses in Vancouver, China, Korea and Toronto.
“I think that we are really at this moment we’re the top one players in this category, and then we’re growing really fast. Our first flagship will be opening in the American Dream (shopping centre in New Jersey) this year in October. That will be 5,400 square feet,” said Peng.
“We are expanding. So not just focusing in Canadian market, but we are expanding to the US as well. Right next to Sephora, and that would be our flagship.”
Peng said the brand will look to grow in the U.S. “but at this moment that I want to focus on my Canadian market. I want to get the word out that we are ready for tier two mall. We are ready for every location that is a possibility. For this year our plan is done. By the end of this year, we will having around 25 stores, but right now, we are actually signing the deals for 2026. Of course, we are getting lots of landlords approaching us.
“I’m pretty sure there are some of the landlords that maybe never heard about us or don’t know yet, but I just want the market to know that we are ready to expand. And our concept being approved for the past two years, every single store that we opened, the sales is significantly like crazy. Like the result is crazy. That’s why we had a really strong relationship with CF (Cadillac Fairview). We pretty much signed every single mall with CF already because CF is the first landlord that we really ever worked with. They know us the best. So they’ve been supporting very well, and then they giving us the really good locations.”
The first store opened July 2022 at the Hillcrest Mall in Richmond Hill followed by a second store in September 2022 at CF Markville in Markham, Ontario. In December 2022, it acquired three other stores. Then in 2023 it opened four stores.
Kiokii is providing a platform for Asian brands to enter the North American market.
Peng said when most people hear the word Kiokii they think of something Asian. The word also sounds similar to the word cute. The word Kiokii was created by Peng to give people the impression of Asia. Also with the brand called ‘Kiokii and . . .’ it gives the impression of more and imagination.
“The idea of the store is bringing the most popular, nice, good quality Asian trendy products to North America,” she said, adding that the majority of products come from Japan, China and Korea.
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