Chamnarn Maytaprechakul, the company's senior chief marketing officer, said group retail sales grew by 10% in the first two months of the year, compared to an earlier projection of 5%. The momentum continued during the first eight days of March as well.

Higher sales were reported for women's and men's fashion, electrical appliances and supermarket goods.

The hike in sales was a result of the company's strategy to scale down its mass market promotions to focus more on customer relationship management, said Mr Chamnarn.

A company survey found that customers were spending between 1,000 to 3,000 baht per time during February and March last year. But from December to February the maximum spend per visit rose to 5,000 baht.

"We have not experienced any panic about the political unrest," he said. "We are more cautious and closely monitoring the situation. If the worst case develops, we are ready to manage it.

"At present, we have already increased the level of security as well as added more than 200 security guards at all our retail outlets."

Mr Chamnarn said The Mall Group was continuing with its marketing activities, as were its tenants.

To spur demand, the company increased its marketing budget by 10% to 600 million baht for the year.

It will also hold a summer campaign called "Salut Summer" at The Mall, The Emporium and Siam Paragon for March 11 to May 9, 2010. The company expects to generate 7.5 billion baht in sales from the 60-day campaign.

The activity is part of a campaign to drive first quarter sales by 8% year-on-year to 12 billion baht.