Pewex () (short for ''Przedsiębiorstwo Eksportu Wewnętrznego'' – Internal Export Company
) was a chain of
hard-currency shops founded in 1972, during the
Communist era in Poland that accepted payment only in
United States dollar
The United States dollar ( symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the officia ...
s and other hard currencies, instead of the country's indigenous currency, the
Złoty.
History
Pewex was created in the 1970s to help combat Communist Poland's foreign currency deficit.
By the late-1960s, it had become apparent that the then socialist
centrally-planned economy of Poland was inefficient. The rule of
Edward Gierek led to a short period of economic prosperity. With the aid of foreign loans, Gierek instituted a programme to modernise industry and increase the availability of consumer goods. The standard of living increased markedly and for a time he was hailed a miracle-worker. The economy, however, began to falter during the
1973 oil crisis
The 1973 oil crisis or first oil crisis began in October 1973 when the members of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC), led by Saudi Arabia, proclaimed an oil embargo. The embargo was targeted at nations that had su ...
and by 1976 price increases became necessary, mostly to ease the repayment of these loans.
To obtain much needed foreign hard currency from Polish society, authorities permitted in 1972 the creation of a network of shops under a state-owned bank named
Pekao. There, the foreign hard currency could be exchanged for both foreign and domestic goods, many of which were unavailable to Poles at that time. Since ownership of hard currency as cash was forbidden and all dollars and
Deutschmarks had to be deposited to dollar bank accounts, authorities introduced
Bon PeKaO
Bon towarowy PeKaO (or simply Bon PeKaO) cheques were substitute legal tender (complementary currency) used in the People's Republic of Poland. The Polish government, needing hard foreign currency, introduced them in 1960. Citizens of Poland ...
cheques, which were tied to the U.S. Dollar in a 1:1 ratio and could be used as currency in Pekao shops. Later on the Pekao bank created a separate company, Przedsiębiorstwo Eksportu Wewnętrznego – the Pewex. While the letter ''x'' is not present in the
Polish alphabet
The Polish alphabet ( Polish: ''alfabet polski'', ''abecadło'') is the script of the Polish language, the basis for the Polish system of orthography. It is based on the Latin alphabet but includes certain letters with diacritics: the ''kre ...
, it was used nevertheless.
During the Communist era, Poles were allowed to own dollars, something that was not allowed in other
Eastern Bloc
The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc and the Soviet Bloc, was the group of socialist states of Central and Eastern Europe, East Asia, Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America under the influence of the Soviet Union that existed du ...
states. Many Poles at the time also received
remittance
A remittance is a non-commercial transfer of money by a foreign worker, a member of a diaspora community, or a citizen with familial ties abroad, for household income in their home country or homeland. Money sent home by migrants competes wi ...
from friends and family members in the United States.
The US Dollars received by Poles could either be used for foreign travel or used at the Pewex shops.
Products that Poles would otherwise have to wait a long time and settle for poor imitations of could be had immediately by buying them at a Pewex shop.
Pewex offered a large number of imported items not available for purchase on the normal market. Items were purchased outside of the
rationing system then in place, and customers did not have to queue up for items.
Items sold include
liquor
Liquor (or a spirit) is an alcoholic drink produced by distillation of grains, fruits, vegetables, or sugar, that have already gone through alcoholic fermentation. Other terms for liquor include: spirit drink, distilled beverage or h ...
, cigarettes, household appliances, candy, cars, computers and furniture.
Shopping at Pewex at the time was seen as a rather exclusive affair, due to the high cost of its items when compared to the average salary at the time.
This turned Pewex into a symbol of luxury and privilege.
At the end of 1989, Pewex had a network of 840 shops in Poland. In 1987, Pewex was noted in a report issued by the
United States Joint Publications Research Service The Joint Publications Research Service (JPRS) was a United States government defense-funded organization that was absorbed into the Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) but its funding and personnel did not transfer. For all practical purp ...
to have had a sales volume of about 70 billion złoty, based on the then-official exchange rate to the US Dollar of "nearly 300 zlotys to the dollar", with a revenue of 20 billion złoty.
Post-Communist government
As part of the peaceful
transition of the economic system in Poland after the
1989 revolution in Poland, the Polish economy was
privatised and the ownership of foreign currency was deregulated. This made the Pekao cheques obsolete and soon afterwards most of the goods that had only been available from Pewex stores started to be sold in private shops as well.
In 1991,
Marian Zacharski
Marian Zacharski (born 1951 in Gdynia, Poland; raised in nearby Sopot), is a former Polish intelligence officer, arrested in 1981 and convicted of espionage against the United States. After four years in prison, he was exchanged for American agent ...
, a former Polish spy who was sentenced to life in prison by American authorities for stealing military secrets and was subsequently released in a
spy exchange, became the chain's owner and CEO.
In 1993, Pewex filed for bankruptcy for the first time. However, this and subsequent bankruptcy filings were rejected. In December 1995, it was announced that a debt restructuring deal would see a bank named Polski Bank Rozwoju, along with two French companies, swap a debt worth 93.6 million zlotys at the time for a majority stake in 1996. In 1997, the approximately 150 stores still operating under the Pewex brand were taken over by Concorde Investissement, and Pewex took over its immovable real estate portfolio as ''Towarzystwo Handlu i Nieruchomości Pewex S.A. (THiN Pewex)''. In 2003, THiN Pewex and Concorde Investissement merged, which resulted in the complete phase-out of the Pewex brand from the Polish market. In December 2013, the Pewex brand was re-activated as an
online shop
Online shopping is a form of electronic commerce which allows consumers to directly buy goods or services from a seller over the Internet using a web browser or a mobile app. Consumers find a product of interest by visiting the website of the r ...
mostly selling
novelty items operated by Monster Media Group, the owners of ''
demotywatory.pl''. The Pewex brand is also used by an otherwise unrelated chain of supermarkets in Italy.
See also
*
Baltona
*
Shortage economy
*
Eastern Bloc economies
*
Beryozka (Russian retail store)
Beriozka (Russian: , lit. ''"little birch tree"'') was the overall name applied to two chains of state-run retail stores in the Soviet Union that sold goods in exchange for foreign currency. Beriozkas sold luxury goods such as chocolate and cav ...
, a Soviet Union counterpart
*
Intershop, an East German counterpart
Further reading
*''Zlot a lot of dollars. (Pewex stores in Poland)'', The Economist, May 1988
References
External links
Atlantyda Ludowa, czyli jak zmarnowano najlepszą markę PRL-u*Ewa Cander-Karolewska
1 August 2007,
{{Hard currency shops in socialist countries
Hard currency shops in socialist countries
Retail companies established in 1972
1972 establishments in Poland
Retail companies of Poland
Defunct retail companies
Polish People's Republic