Berjoska

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WneschPossylTorg check for three rubles

Beryozka ( Russian Берёзка , German " Birklein " , according to the Russian " national tree "; officially used transcription in Latin script Beriozka ) were retail stores in the Russian SFSR , which from 1964 to value items sold to foreigners or under strict conditions to specific groups of Soviet citizens. Outside of these stores, the offer was either unavailable or very expensive in the Soviet Union .

The forerunners of the Berjoska stores were the Torgsin in the 1930s and the very inefficient WneschPossylTorg departments of the state department stores in many large Soviet cities, which were organized along the lines of the Moscow GUM department store . You could order goods there by post against a value date.

The retail chain WneschPossylTorg existed especially for Soviet citizens who received part of their salary in foreign currencies. They were forced to exchange them for ruble checks in order to be able to buy goods there.

The Berjoska business chain sold the same items against currency and so-called "D-series checks" from Wneschtorgbank . There were also shops in this chain in other Union republics , but they were usually named after the respective “national tree” or other symbol, such as Kazchtan (“ chestnut ”) in Ukrainian , Tschinara (“ plane tree ”) in Azerbaijani , Dzintars (“ Bernstein ”) in the Latvian SSR etc. The shops were theoretically only allowed to be entered by foreigners (and certain Soviet citizens, such as high party members or even non-party Soviet citizens who had long-term professional activities abroad), since the private property of foreign convertible currencies was banned. In the last years of the existence of the Soviet Union and with it the Berjoska shops, however, these restrictions were handled with increasing ease.

In addition, there were Albatros shops in Soviet port cities for returning seafarers, whose goods were handed in against TorgMorTrans checks , issued by the naval office against Heuer in convertible foreign currency.

After the ruble became convertible in the early 1990s , the Berjoska stores became obsolete. They were privatized and many of them later filed for bankruptcy.

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literature

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