Pop Up retailers an attractive addition to shopping centres

CHRIS HERDE
NOVEMBER 21, 2014
THE COURIER-MAIL
IF YOU look around … they’re popping up everywhere.
From being a retail oddity a few years ago, the pop-up shop phenomenon is here to stay, and has become an increasingly vital part of the market.
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Laura Chong, director of online fashion retailer for the corporate woman 400 co, recently signed up for a two-week Pop Up lease on the ground floor of the JLL-managed Wintergarden off Queen Street Mall.
“We’re an online boutique and being a new business it’s a good way for our customers to come in and try things on and feel the quality of our clothing,” she said.
“But we’ve actually gained a whole heap of new customers just by opening this Pop Up shop.
“We were meant to be here two weeks but now we’ve extended it to four months.”
JLL’s director of Retail Property and Asset Management Jacqui Kinloch said property owners need to include Pop Ups in their overall strategies to remain ahead of the consumer consumption curve.
“We now consider Pop Up tenancies as part of overall leasing plans,” she said.
“For some clients we factor in a Pop Up space to be permanently filled with a range of users over a 12-month period.
“For shopping centres this can be a great asset as each Pop Up represents effectively a new brand to the centre, appealing to new markets and generating new foot traffic”
Ms Kinloch said an analysis of data shows that the Pop Up leasing category within JLL-managed shopping centres has had double digit year-on-year sales growth since 2012 with no signs of slowing.
“With vacancy rates across some sectors at 6.8 per cent, finding space is easier and property owners are fully supportive of the temporary retail space-taker,” she said.
“Pop Up shops might have been seen as a response to recession-induced change but now have broader significance as a champion of wider change processes.”