Coffee shops and car parking are helping out of town retail parks to flourish at a time when high street stores and shopping centres are suffering from dwindling numbers of shoppers, according to a Bristol-based director at commercial property specialist Colliers International.
Nick Turk said a new report by Colliers International showed out of town retail parks such as the Willow Brook Centre in Bradley Stoke; Imperial Park at Knowle West; Emersons Green; and Gallagher Retail Park at Longwell Green were attracting both consumers and investors at a time when other physical retail sectors had been affected by the rise of online shopping.
He added that the report, called ‘Heading out of town: The changing landscape of the retail warehousing market’, showed footfall at out of town retail parks had recorded growth for the 25th consecutive month in January 2016 and a 5.2 per cent year-on-year increase – and he noted that a factor in this growth had been the presence of coffee shops and car parking at these locations.
Mr Turk, who is Lease Advisory Director in the Out of Town Retail Team at Colliers, explained: “The impact of increased online spending has had an impact upon all shopping environments, but interestingly because of the free parking they offer retail parks are benefitting from internet shopping as they are regarded as good places for picking up click and collect purchases.
“In addition to being attracted by the convenience of free and plentiful parking at out of town retail parks, shoppers are also drawn by the presence of coffee shops and restaurants, such as Costa Coffee, Frankie and Bennys or Chiquitos.
“These are understandably popular with shoppers because it means they can do some shopping and then take a break for a coffee or a meal. They are also of benefit to retailers because they increase dwell time and discretionary purchases of items that had not been the original reason for visiting the retail park.
“A good example of this is the Willow Brook Centre at Bradley Stoke, where Colliers International represents Spen Hill Management, which asset manages the centre. There is a food square there which creates a good mix alongside the range of shops and is a magnet for bringing people in.”
The report points out that out of town retail parks are not only attracting shoppers. Investors are also focusing upon them, and in 2015 investment volumes in UK retail parks exceeded £4bn, which is a nine year high and a return to pre-recession levels. However, uncertainty in the run-up to the EU referendum has affected the first quarter of this year and investment volumes have been down 26 per cent year-on-year.
In addition, the increasing popularity of retail parks among retailers and food and beverage companies has resulted in the level of vacant space on UK retail parks reaching its lowest level since 2006.
Mr Turk said: “One of the issues now with retail warehousing is that there is almost not enough room in some out of town parks for the number of restaurants that want to open up in them.
“Often older retail parks were built to contain just one or two places to eat and there is no room for any other restaurants to open. For example, at Exeter Retail Park in Devon there is a McDonalds and a Costa, but there has been such demand for A3 use in that area that a new development has opened up just south of the park with a Frankie & Benny’s, a KFC and a Chiquitos opening recently.
“Modern retail parks are designed to enable more restaurant use than before, and these parks are very successful. A good example is St Oswald’s Retail Park in Gloucester, which has six restaurant units with Harvester; Domino’s Pizza; Frankie and Benny’s; Subway, McDonald’s and a Costa.”
