JD Sports Fashion plans to open 20 JD stores in and around Paris and five to six shops in Marseille as the group focuses on its development in France this year, chairman Peter Cowgill said in an interview with the Financial Times. Cowgill explained that the JD format, focused on urban streetwear, performs “at its best” in bigger French cities and that the group will convert more Chausport stores to the JD banner in the larger locations. At the end of the fiscal year finished on Jan. 29, the company had three JD stores and 73 Chausport shops in France. Last year, a Chausport store in Lille was converted to the JD King of Trainers format and a further two Chausport stores, in Angers and Amiens, are scheduled to be converted to the format in 2011. In the U.K., some new JD stores are likely to be in railway stations following the success of its first store in Liverpool Street Station in London.

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