Westfield’s Merry Hill shopping centre near Dudley has slipped one place in a league table of the UK’s most attractive shopping centres due to the developer’s new opening in London.
Trevor Wood Associates has published the latest edition of its regular report Going Shopping – The Definitive Guide to Shopping Centres, which follows the previous edition in 2011. This report ranks Britain’s top 500 shopping centres on their overall attractiveness to customers, based on factors including their size, tenants, weekly footfall and other facilities.
Westfield Merry Hill has been named the UK’s 8th most attractive shopping centre, having slipped from 7th in 2011. This is partly due to the opening of Westfield’s new Stratford City shopping centre in east London, although the attractiveness of the centre has also suffered in the face of tough retail conditions.
Other centres in the West Midlands in the report include the Bullring in Birmingham, which has remained 14th and improved its retail offer over the last two years; The Telford Shopping Centre fell one place to 19th; Kingfisher Shopping Centre in Redditch dropped five places to 26th; Touchwood in Solihull, which stayed 46th; Capital Shopping Centres’ The Potteries moved up from 59th to 56th while Wolverhampton’s Mander Shopping Centre fell eight places to 75th.
Across the whole of the UK, the research shows how the recession is having a big impact on the mix of tenants in major shopping centres.
High street chemist Boots is now rated as the leading tenant in UK shopping centres, climbing from third place in the table, and replacing ailing chain Clinton Cards, which dropped from top to 17th position. Struggling computer game retailer Game has also dropped out of the top ten, while new entrants to the top ten include Costa Coffee, Card Factory and Phones 4 U.
Trevor Wood Associates also shows how the recession has taken a toll on the pipeline of new developments, which is at its lowest level since this piece of research was first published in 1998. The retail property specialist identified just 87 proposed new schemes or major extensions to existing schemes that are thought likely to proceed before the end of 2019.
These include Tesco’s 473,000 sq ft New Square scheme in West Bromwich, which is onsite and is due to complete next year with tenants including Next, Primark and Tesco Extra; and the 650,000 sq ft City Sentral development in Stoke-on-Trent, which is being built by Realis Estates and is due to complete in 2015, with tenants including Marks & Spencer and Next.