Çilek, a Turkish children's furniture producer, plans to make the brand more export-focused during the next decade. The ratio of exports of all production is likely to increase from the current 54 percent to 95 percent by 2020, Muzaffer Çilek, general manager of the firm, says

In early January, Çilek opened a store in Lagos, Nigeria. In the coming three years, the number of Çilek stores in Nigeria is likely to increase to four.

The global crisis is effectively over for Çilek, a Turkish children's furniture manufacturer, according to the company’s managing director.

"In the 14 years prior to 2008, we used to grow by some 30 percent annually. With the crisis the growth came to a halt, but we did not have any major losses either. For this year, we are expecting a growth of 28 percent. For us, the crisis is over," Muzaffer Çilek told the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review in an interview Monday.

Çilek, which has its headquarters in Istanbul and production facilities in Inegöl, Bursa, was established by the Çilek family in 1995. Today, the firm employs some 600 people in Turkey and has 400 outlets in 65 countries, most of them on a franchise basis.

"During 2009, as trade in Russia and Ukraine declined, we started focusing our business in the Middle East, including Iran, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates," Çilek said.

Because of the volatile market environment in 2009, Çilek's turnover in Russia and Ukraine declined by 45 percent. Çilek currently has 21 stores in Ukraine and 23 in Russia. "Despite the recent misfortunes, we expect these markets to recover and have therefore decided to increase the number of our shops in Russia and Ukraine from the current 23 to 195 by the year 2017," he said.

Expansion in Africa

Overall, the network of Çilek stores is expected to increase 10-fold from the current 440 to 4,400 in the coming 10 years, the director said.

In early January, Çilek opened a store in Lagos, Nigeria, with three more stores likely to be opened in the country in the next three years. The firm is now planning to open a regional office in Nairobi, Kenya, to oversee stores in Central African countries.

"We have already established a presence via various stores in North Africa as well as the Republic of South Africa. The office in Nairobi, which could open by the end of this year, would serve the local market and complement our other overseas offices – in Miami, Cologne, Sarajevo and Tokyo," Çilek said.

Despite the difficult market environment, Çilek's European business fared relatively well during 2009, Çilek said. However, selling a Turkish brand in Europe can be challenging, he admitted.

"We were not really sure if German consumers would be interested in buying a Turkish brand but, in overcoming potential challenges, we opened a store on the best shopping street – Hohenstaufenring – in Cologne in 2004. We decided that if that could survive and make a profit, we could also start franchising our brand in Europe and so it happened," he said.

In Greece, Çilek said local franchisers were initially wary of openly marketing Turkish products.

"In fact, some of them said the items would have to be packaged so that there would only be Greek labels and that the origins would not be so visibly marked in them. But we rejected this because we believe Greek parents would buy Turkish-made furniture for their children. After all, the problems between Greece and Turkey are not between the two peoples. They are of a political nature," he said.

The strategy proved successful and seven years later, Çilek's furniture is being sold in 12 stores in Greece.

Çilek envisions the expanded network of sales outlets increasing the chain's turnover from 200 million to 2 billion Turkish Liras. "This year our growth will come from the new overseas sales outlets as well as from the expanded variety of accessories that we have started to sell," Çilek said.

Despite ambitious expansion plans, the firm is not looking for a strategic partner or an investor. "We are not planning to expand to new sectors either – kids' furniture is a challenging market as it only makes 4 percent of all furniture sales