Retailers seek to tap Asian shopping dollars<\/p>\n
By Anil Penna<\/p>\n
SINGAPORE (AFP): Top retailers from around the world are
\ngathering in Singapore to explore investment opportunities in
\nAsia's shopping industry, headed for a broad boom on the back of
\nan upwardly-mobile middle-class.<\/p>\n
Where they decide to set up shop after three days of
\nbrainstorming from Sunday could determine which city will become
\nthe future shopping mecca of Asia, perhaps overtaking Singapore
\nand Hong Kong, the organizers say.<\/p>\n
American and European retailers with plans for expansion in
\nAsia will meet the region's shopping-center developers, property
\nexperts and architects at the convention organized by the
\nInternational Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC).<\/p>\n
The 500 participants will discuss retail trends, investment
\nopportunities and problems, the future of shopping in the region,
\nchanging tastes of Asian shoppers, funding and leasing, marketing
\nand management, the organizers said.<\/p>\n
The biggest developers in Asia, including Hong Kong giant
\nHutchison Whampoa\/Cheung Kong Group of Companies and Kuala Lumpur
\nCity Center of Malaysia, will be in attendance.<\/p>\n
McDonald's, AMC Theaters, Wherehouse Entertainment and
\nPriceCotsco, The Wharf Group, Scott's, Swire and Sun Hung Kai
\nwill also be present.<\/p>\n
Lawrence Elms, regional general manager of the New York-
\nheadquartered, non-profit ICSC, said the convention would
\ninfluence the big-money decision-making of the world's leading
\nretailers eying Asian shopping dollars.<\/p>\n
The theme of the convention is \"Three Billion Shoppers -- the
\nAsian Shopping Center Challenge,\" testifying to the increasing
\nspending power of an image-conscious middle class.<\/p>\n
Shopping centers are taking shape rapidly throughout the
\nregion at a rate and a scale never seen before and \"what is
\ndawning is a retail investment bonanza,\" the ICSC says.<\/p>\n
\"In the Asia-Pacific, principally in China and India, there is
\nan emerging population with a growing level of affluence and
\ngrowing consumer needs and desires,\" Elms said.<\/p>\n
\"We have marketed very heavily this convention to the North
\nAmericans and Europeans. They are all looking at this market and
\nlooking to establish a presence here,\" he said.<\/p>\n
The convention comes at a time when retailers in Hong Kong and
\nSingapore, the traditional shoppers' meccas of Asia, are
\nstruggling against a slump that has eaten into their bottom-lines
\nand turned the cities into a shop-owner's hell.<\/p>\n
Singapore's Trade and Industry Minister Yeo Cheow Tong
\nrecently noted that other regional cities were catching up as
\nshopping destinations.<\/p>\n
\"Today, huge modern shopping complexes are common in the
\ncapital cities like Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur and Bangkok,\" Yeo said.<\/p>\n
Bangkok boasts the largest shopping mall in Asia, Kuala Lumpur
\nhas a 10-storey Sogo department store and will soon have a huge
\nshopping complex at the twin Petronas Towers, while Jakarta is
\nreadying the five-storey Mega Mall, Yeo said.<\/p>\n
Elms said a boom in the construction of shopping malls was
\ntaking place across Asia, fueled partly by speculation and partly
\nby pent-up demand, and developers were trying to lure
\ninternational brand-name retailers.<\/p>\n
\"You have a situation where in Bangkok, in Jakarta, in
\nMalaysia, a record number of shopping centers are being developed
\nalmost simultaneously,\" he said.<\/p>\n
In Taiwan, the government was considering a change of zoning
\nlaws to permit the construction of shopping centers, he said.<\/p>\n
Elms predicted a \"paradigm shift from current market and
\ncurrent consumer trends virtually overnight with the provision of
\nworld-class shopping centers\" in Taiwan.<\/p>\n
\"The same thing will happen in China, in Korea and India where
\nthere are no shopping centers as we know them.<\/p>\n
\"There are traditional small stores and may be some
\ndepartmental stores but there are no shopping centers that offer
\na complete range of merchandise and a complete solution for
\nentertainment and leisure in a one-roof airconditioned
\nenvironment.\"<\/p>\n
He said consumer habits in such countries would change
\n\"markedly\" once they enter the age of mega malls.<\/p>",
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