When you go to Carrefour's three-storey hypermarket in the Gubei district of Shanghai, it is hard to tell if you are in a shop or a factory.
Goods are piled up to the ceiling and in the aisles, and customers load their purchases on large carts. Linger for a few seconds and a cart is pressing into your ankles, telling you it is time to move on.
Shoppers move along a circuit marked with large signs, up to each floor and then a long row of payment counters. For a taxi, they go to the basement floor where they queue up, under the direction of military-style staff - like trucks taking goods from the end of a production line.
With six 10,000 square metre hypermarkets in Shanghai out of its 36 in China, Carrefour is the most successful foreign entrant in the city's retail market.
Because most people do not have cars, it has located its stores in densely populated urban areas, not in the suburbs as in Europe and the United States, and provides shuttle buses to nearby districts.
The world's biggest retailer, Wal-Mart, with 26 stores in China, will open its first outlet in Beijing in June and is planning its first in Shanghai.