Carrefour Batu Pahat now open!

I know I rarely go back to Malaysia but I always read up on thestar.com.my for Malaysian news updates as well as getting "local" (i.e. Batu Pahat) info from family and friends.

So the latest hot news in Batu Pahat's development in my opinion would have to be the opening of Carrefour Batu Pahat! In my opinion it's long overdue, considering that there's a rather significant population in Batu Pahat and surrounding areas that would surely "support" a hypermarket. With the opening of Carrefour in Batu Pahat, people from Air Hitam, Parit Raja, Yong Peng and Tongkang Pechah, or even Muar and Kluang, would not need to travel too far for their hypermarket shopping experience.

And they've got a website too: http://www.carrefour.com.my/bp/index.html

Interesting things to note is that the tenants include Delifrance and The Chicken Rice Shop who are newcomers in the restaurant/fast food market in Batu Pahat, and that'll bring more variety. The last restaurant that attracted my attention was Secret Recipe along Jalan Rahmat.

The location of Carrefour Batu Pahat is rather obscure, so that explains for the many signboards placed along Jalan Batu Pahat/Jalan Kluang. It's a convenient location for many Batu Pahat resident however, as there are at least 10 housing estates near there (Carrefour Batu Pahat itself is located within Taman Flora Utama). It's also near to many schools though, such as Convent girls school. I bet it will be a popular hangout place in the future.

Went to an online Batu Pahat forum (in Chinese) to see what people thought about it. Most of them mention that the hypermarket would be a strong competitor to nearby shops, markets and even bakeries. I guess that's inevitable... those shops just gotta modernise themselves, improve on their services, layout of their shops, products etc. so that they do not become obsolete. (Resistance is futile... muahahahaha...)

Prior to Carrefour, Batu Pahat residents only had the option of going to The Summit (which is getting boring... it opened in 1997 and hasn't had any significant refurbishment), Wira Court (which is under-maintained), and a bunch of smaller departmental stores (The Store, Fajar). I've heard that a "Pacific hypermarket" (linked to "The Store") or something is coming up too, and the forum people say it's a main tenant at Batu Pahat Mall which is under construction. But what I really sure is that there's a Batu Pahat Mall being built that is like the largest retail cum service apartment development project I have ever seen in Batu Pahat. And it's situated along the busiest road... Jalan Kluang. Forum people say its slated to open in January 2007... The mall only, coz there's not enough time to build the apartments.

Another thing to note... Batu Pahat is also quite popular with Singaporeans. So I guess we'll also see more Singaporeans travelling up to Batu Pahat. (Gosh, reminds me of the queues at McDonalds during the Hello Kitty craze... @.@ Crazy Singaporeans... hahahaha...)