Elena Marković

I grew up between Belgrade and Herceg Novi, which is probably why the Balkan retail landscape has never felt like a niche assignment to me. It felt like home reporting. When I joined the editorial board in late 2013, the industry across the region was almost invisible — a handful of storefronts hidden behind residential doors in Novi Sad, a couple of curtained boutiques in downtown Belgrade, and an emerging online scene that most consumers were too shy to search for.

Over the last twelve years I’ve watched that change from a front-row seat. What began as scattered, semi-underground retail has matured into a proper regional market with real distribution networks, real customer service standards, and — finally — real editorial coverage. My beat covers physical storefronts and their online counterparts in Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia, North Macedonia, Croatia and Slovenia, with occasional trips through Bulgaria and Romania when the story warrants it.

I take regional coverage seriously because most English-language adult retail journalism treats the Balkans as one undifferentiated blur. In practice, buying an adult product in Podgorica in July is completely different from buying one in Ljubljana in December — different regulatory posture, different consumer habits, different logistics reality. My job is to explain those distinctions to readers who deserve better than a paragraph of vague continental generalisation.

I try to visit every storefront I write about at least once, and to actually purchase and use products before I recommend them. Where that’s not possible I say so explicitly. My guides are not affiliate-driven listicles — they’re the retail journalism I wish had existed when I first started this beat.

When I’m not filing, I teach a short journalism module at a Belgrade media school and occasionally consult for regional trade associations on distribution ethics. My favourite part of the job remains a quiet Tuesday morning in a shop I’ve never visited, notebook in hand, asking a shopkeeper questions nobody else has bothered to ask.