【Epidemic Unblocked】Commercial real estate is experiencing a boom while customers are paying less
TEXT_Irene Hung
After around three years of the pandemic outbreak, 2023 is supposed to be a prosperous year since not only people can travel abroad freely but also enterprises return to normal operation. To take Taiwan as an example, in these two years by 2025, there are at least 48 shopping mall developments completed and one third of them are about to open sooner rather than later this year. Even this comparatively small nation in Asia is experiencing the commercial harvest, not alone the other major economic centres of the globe.
Despite of the estimated economic growth, it appears that more people are pessimistic about the forthcoming future. For instance:
Supply chain — Transportation capacity problems remain as the Russia-Ukraine War is unsettled and China is an unexploded bomb as well. Besides, customer demand shifts from goods to services since the inflationary pressures. Supply chain costs will tighten and thus building a business with optimisation, resilience, and sustainability is a must.
Tech — ChatGPT and AI have become the hottest topic among the season instead of Metaverse. Layoffs in giant tech companies appear to be storming news; however, in my opinion, it doesn’t mean an economic recession crisis but an overall re-adjust of the business that enterprises predict differently between pandemic period and post era.
Employment — To cite the caption of the journal of Business Weekly, “when AI is as smart as a 9-year-old child, although AI will not replace you, people who make good use of AI will!” Hence, the future society can still operate smoothly without a large quantity of human workforce as today. It is a sign that people should be worried about how to enhance their competitiveness.
Entertainment — People flood to tourist attractions cross-border everywhere. Nonetheless, retail stores might not experience an optimistic rise because customer demand and consumption channel have changed dramatically. People visit physical places to feel the atmosphere and to pay for the experiences or memories.
In an era of excess stock, excess consumer goods, excess commercial real estate developments, customers are tired of too many options and also become smarter to pay for something that is good value for money. Consequently, malls designed as “shopping” appear to be less appealing and less profitable; on the other hand, those designed as “life style” or “holiday plan” turn out to be ideal projects. The following 3 retail site brands are of my recommendation that mesmerise me recently.
Before it is developed as a premium supermarket located in Milan Italy, it was renovated from an opera house. Containing the local ingredients, food markets and restaurants, Eataly combines the concept of “farm to table” and a lifestyle of eat-entertainment. No matter people who buy ingredients that are wrapped into present-like packages to cook at home or those who have meals in the restaurants, they enjoy the precious moments of eating. A sustainable spot should attract both local citizens and tourists.
It’s a mall in Madrid Spain defining the new retail store can be creative with art. The physical and digital world come together to reinvent the idea full of imagination.
A stay in Margaritaville Resort & Hotel can reenergise an exhausted soul. Margaritaville is an American resort brand, integrating holiday plans for sea life, festival, yacht party, cuisine, souvenirs, and so on. An ideal vacation soothes the stress people have, and turn it into motivation for working harder.
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