Moscow, 14 October 2019 – X5 Retail Group (“X5” or the “Company”), a leading Russian food retailer (LSE and MOEX ticker: “FIVE”), announces the full roll-out of a joint project between Pyaterochka proximity stores, the Centre to Search for Missing People (CSMP) and the Liza Alert search and rescue team. “Safety zones” have already been set up in 14,500 Pyaterochka stores across 65 regions.
“Safety zones” are special areas in each Pyaterochka store marked by an orange geolocation sign, which serve as a landmark for lost people. In the store, a lost person can either ask any employee for help or wait for assistance in the designated area. Some 50,000 Pyaterochka employees have been trained to identify lost or disoriented persons, and have been provided with guidelines on actions take if a lost individual is spotted in a store. The instructions call for the store director to call the CSMP hotline to report each case. Depending on the circumstances, the CSMP operator will decide whether to call an ambulance, the police, or to contact Liza Alert, who will send a representative to the store.
Pyaterochka is the first retail chain to team up with Liza Alert and launch a project that aims to assist a wide range of people, from those suffering from dementia to lost children. According to Liza Alert, some 100,000 people are reported missing in Russia every year. “Safety zones” will help and lost elderly person or child to return home. During the five-month pilot involving 2,600 stores in Moscow and the Moscow region, assistance was provided to 118 people, 13 of whom received urgent medical treatment thanks to store staff calling an ambulance for them.
On top of that, Pyaterochka and Liza Alert have created a special website liza.5ka.ru, containing the addresses of Pyaterochka stores that offer assistance to lost people, and providing useful information about the project and help to disoriented people. It also publishes stories from volunteers and instructs visitors how to contribute to the search for missing people.
“Taking care of people and participating in the life of local communities is an integral part of our mission. I am happy to see that the teams at our stores are becoming active participants in civil society and can make a contribution to help return missing people to their families safe and sound,” said Sergei Goncharov, General Director of Pyaterochka.
“Any help in finding missing people does matter. However, our partnership with the Pyaterochka retail chain is of particular significance for us. The professional assistance that a lost or disoriented person can get in a retail store in almost any neighbourhood helps to find and rescue many people. Even one trained and competent employee in each store helps us save time and resources searching for people,” said Grigory Sergeev, General Director at CSMP and leader of Liza Alert.