The fall should see three new outdoor shopping malls – Investors’ interest in retail parks in Serbia still high

As Ivan Simic, a director of Danos, a company hired for space lease in almost all retail parks in our country, says for our portal, there is still investors’ interest in investing in retail parks.

The first new retail park will open its doors April 3, it was confirmed to eKapija by the Poseidon Group, which is, together with Yu Kapital, an investor of Sabac-based shopping mall. The construction of the Capitol park started mid next year. The facility will have 17 stores between 109 and 3.000 m2 with 395 parking places.

In Zemun, on Novosadski put, construction of the One Zemun retail park will end soon. It will occupy 15.000 m2. As eKapija finds out, buyers will have 50 shops and the announced leases are Univerexport on 500 m2, Home centar on 2.000 m2 and a playground Space on 50 m2.

- We have already signed the contract with sports brands Djak, N Sport and Treff as well as with the Lilly company. When it comes to apparel and footwear brands, we do not want to expose the names yet but we promise that brands will be different from the ones in the existing shopping malls – Representatives of the Israeli company, Industrial Buildings Corporation (IBC), which is an investor of the complex, say for eKapija.

As the company announces, opening of the retail park, One Zemun, will be in September this year or in March 2015. Apart from the shopping mall, visitors will have at their disposal an outdoor entertainment park for kids and grown-ups on 20.000 m2.

Jagodina will also get an outdoor shopping mall this year. The construction of the Vivo shopping park started in December 2013 and weather conditions were favorable for construction workers so the works progress faster than planned..

As investors say, leasees show great interest in the retail park.

According to investors’ announcements, Cacak should also get retail park. In 2007, Slovenian company, Toming inzenjering, bought land in Cacak but due to market trends they opted this year to start the project. Retail park should occupy 7.000 m2 with some240 parking places which will have more than 10 shops. Although it was announced that the works should start in late March, eKapija finds out that deadlines will extended due to paperwork.

Apart from that, as we found out, the announced constructions of Sabac-based Big CEE and Leskovac-based Pluto park have been halted for the moment.

Pancevo-based Aviv Park, Kragujevac-based Delta park, Novi Sad-based Big CEE and Indjija-based Fashion park have been operating for a few years now.

Planned retail parks in Belgrade

Israeli company Aviv Arlon should soon start construction of a retail park in Zvezdara. The object called Aviv Park Zvezdara will occupy 11.500 m2 in Zivko Davidovic St. No. 86 in Belgrade.

Apart from Univerexport hypermarket which occupies2.500 m2, Aviv Park Zvezdara will comprise apparel shops, shoe stores, kids’ stores, restaurants and services, etc.

As representatives of Aviv Arlon said for eKapija, the works should end in the fall 2015.

We asked Ivan Simic, director at Danos where in Belgrade it would be convenient to build this kind of a retail complex.

- When it comes to Belgrade, it is only possible to develop a real retail park on some 30.000 m2 or bigger in Petlovo brdo or Ibarska magistrala. Apart from that, there is an option of development of a few smaller neighborhood malls such as Immo centar and Shopping center Karaburma in parts of the city where there is still no offer, for instance Konjarnik, Banjica, Borča, Vidikovac, Banovo brdo – our collocutor says.

Simic mentions that the capital has room for another A class shopping mall on an area of 30.000-40.000 square meters such as Usce and Delta City, but in the old part of the city.

Retail park

Instead of closed shopping malls with artificial light and air conditions, retail park offers outdoor shopping, in greenery, with a number of additional facilities for the whole family. Retail parks are located outside the central city zones because they occupy larger space.

Retail parks are facilities on one level, without basements and floors and they comprise a number of separate outlets gathered into a whole. The whole is mostly in a shape of a Cyrillic letter “p” where one can enter directly from an outdoor environment, which consists of access roads with parking and a plateau with green areas and pedestrian zones along the entrance into outlets.

Monthly renting fee in retail park is a lot cheaper compared to shopping mall and maintenance fees are lower as well.

Suzana Obradovic