Shopping Centre News Magazine - December 2018 - January 2019

In this issue

2018 turned out to be an outstanding year for the Indian
Shopping Mall Industry. Not only did the year witness the
restructuring of malls in India as FECs but it was also the
year when malls took to technology seriously, adopting
new facilities and upgrading existing ones – all towards
consumer convenience.
Even as the overall economy struggled, and the retail
industry was rife with rumours of ‘the shopping mall
is dead’, stakeholders understood the importance of
developing multichannel retailing and adopted the practice
with vigour, leaving behind traditional methods. This led
to a remarkable shift in the Indian Shopping Mall Industry.
With fundamental growth drivers of the retail sector staying
intact – rising disposable income, rapid urbanization,
increasing purchasing power – global investors and
shopping mall developers remain bullish on the sector.
Bigger malls –both in terms of space and services – were
launched, while older malls decided to reinvent themselves.
The industry was drawn towards a new consumer set
– Tier II cities. A large number of malls and investors
turned focus on the South and East of India. Cities
including Bhubaneswar, Siliguri, Rourkela, Ranchi, Patna,
Thane, Pune, Ludhiana, Kochi and Nagpur witnessed an
incline in retail and malls in their region. Saturation of the
metros due to limited space availability, mounting rental
values and escalating infrastructure issues fuelled retail
growth in smaller cities like Ahmedabad, Bhubaneshwar,
Thiruvananthapuram, Jaipur, Lucknow, to name just a few.
The December 2018-January 2019 year-ender edition of
Shopping Centre News, took an in-depth look at the Indian
retail real estate sector, including a deep dive into what
malls did right in 2018 and how they are gearing up for
2019. Heads of leading Indian malls outline all experiences
and innovations they have been and will be working on in
2019 to lure the consumer, keep him spending and turn
him loyal.