Press Release - June 25th 2002
Sonae Imobiliária and Miller Developments' 2nd joint project
Coimbra Retail Park's construction starts in September
Sonae Imobiliária and Miller Developments will begin in September the construction of Coimbra Retail Park, with its inauguration scheduled for the spring of 2003.
Located by the Eiras road, in the city's natural expansion area, the Coimbra Retail Park will have 12
new shops covering 12.800 m2 of Gross Lettable Area (GLA) and 560 new parking spaces to which a set of pre-existing Modelo Continente shops will be associated, such as Modelo, Autocenter, Worten and Modalfa, which represent 5.500 m2 of GLA and attract 1,7 million visits per year.
When inaugurated, the undertaking will have a total of 18.300 m2 of GLA, and 38% of the new shops' GLA is already marketed with the Mestre Maco (Do-It-Yourself), San Luis (Household Appliances) and Multiopticas (Eye Care) brands. In its total (existing shops + new shops), the Coimbra Retail Park has 60% of its GLA already committed.
The complementarity which will exist between the Retail Park's existing offer and its new offer will be a true trade point with a high attraction power, thus allowing the Coimbra Retail Park's number of visits per year estimate to increase to 2,5 million visits. The Coimbra Retail Park has an innovative image, in which the use of light-treated, pale-coloured panels stands out, since it allows the distinguishing of each of the units in this commercial park.
With an investment of €15 million, the Coimbra Retail Park is situated in an area only 20 minutes away from 174 thousand inhabitants, responsible for an annual consumption of €1.1 million.
The Coimbra Retail Park is a result of the joint-venture Sonae Imobiliária and Miller Developments have formed in April 1998 for the development of Retail Parks in Portugal and Spain. This will be Sonae Imobiliária's second undertaking in the city of Coimbra, 10 years after the inauguration of CoimbraShopping, which has been the city's main commerce and leisure centre with over 7,4 million visits in 2001.
Besides Coimbra, Sonae Imobiliária and Miller Development are planning Setúbal and Maia's Retail Parks, which are now in the licensing stage.
The Sintra Retail Park, the first Portuguese retail park inaugurated by the joint-venture, in November 2000, has had since its opening an average of 108.000 visits per month and has shown in 2002 a average monthly increase of number of visits of 19%, thus demonstrating this commercial format's acceptance in Portugal.
Retail Parks, the reasons to a success
The Retail Park is a site comprised of several average dimension commercial units, with areas ranging from 500 to 4000 m2. Its main benefit resides in the fact that it allows shopkeepers a larger product display area with significantly lower costs compared to those of a shopping centre, with far more competitive rents, simultaneously satisfying the consumer's expectations in terms of dimension and offer variety, in activity branches carefully defined.
This concept, originally from the United States - where nowadays it has an important status in the consumers' range of choice - finds its biggest European expression in the United Kingdom and Germany, countries that hold about 75% of the Retail Parks Market. The rest is in Scandinavia, Northern and Central Europe, with Italy holding 20% and Spain the other 5%.
The strong growth witnessed in this market is mostly due to the offer variety and complementarity which characterize the Retail Parks, in an extremely attractive combination for the consumer, as well as a generalized purchasing power increase, which has made way for the acquisition of typical Retail Park products, such as home and office articles, do-it-yourself products, household appliances, consumer electronics, toys, clothing and footwear, sports articles and car accessories