ABSTRACT
World interest in the Russian/Soviet economy focused on two major turning points in the country’s history: the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution and creation of the Soviet Union, replacing capitalism with socialism; and the transition beginning in the mid-1980s from a country where marketing was anathema to one where marketing took on new scope and importance. A millennium ago Russian lands already were criss-crossed by important trade routes, along the Danube and Dnieper Rivers, connecting with the Black, Azov and Caspian Seas. The earliest active traders were Varangians to the north, seeking to trade with centres of wealth and high culture to the south, including Greek tribes and Byzantium. Urban development and industrialization progressed rapidly in this period, reliant on imported capital equipment and consumer goods from the West, paid for by exports of grain and timber from Russia’s countryside. Retail businesses in cities and towns included small shops, street vending and open-air and covered markets.
