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05 December 2018
www.thevillagenews.co.za
OPINION MATTERS On My Mind
Reinvent yourself, CBD
Writer Raphael da Silva Along with all the chaos of Black Friday specials that has seen queues snaking out of many national retail stores, there has been a lot of talk recently about shopping centres in our community. One is just celebrating its first-year anniversary. A second is in the midst of a shift in strategy after losing a key anchor tenant to the competition. Two others will need to undergo major changes if they are to remain competitive, as they too lose tenants. To top it all off, we have seen notification of a proposal to rezone land for yet another centre. If it does go ahead, we will have three shopping centres within two kilometres of each other. Amid all this, we continue to hear about the impact this is having on the Hermanus Old Town, where shops and restaurants seem to be closing on an ever-increasing basis, despite the fact that the holiday season, the tourists, and summer are already upon us. And this is just in Hermanus. If we add the shopping centre in Gansbaai and the one in Kleinmond, we have at least six bigger sized shopping areas in the Overstrand. It is amazing to reflect that it is just a little over a year since our papers were awash with comments from consultants that the Whale Coast Mall wouldn’t impact on the CBD, ostensibly, they argued, because only the national chains would be there. Hmmm. Not sure about that. It is precisely because there are national chains that this mall has been so popular. It is evident consumers are choosing, not with their feet, but with their cars where to shop. Just as the Germans love their cars, the Canadians their donuts, the priests of Vatican City their wine, and the Americans, anything that is
super-sized, South Africans love their shopping centres. While shopping malls are a dying breed in many parts of the world, particularly in countries where online shopping has taken off, South Africa continues to build. In fact, we have built 2 000 of them so far, one for every 28 000 of us. According to the SA Council of Shopping Centres, our rainbow nation has the 6th most shopping centres in the world. Along with Canada and the US, South Africa has the highest level of shopping centre supply in relation to household consumption expenditure. This is just a fancy way of saying that South Africans spend an awful lot of their salaries in malls compared to other retail spaces. This is mostly driven by the fact that our centres always have supermarkets as key tenants. Makes sense. Food is important, and most families spend the largest part of their disposable income on keeping their tummies full. Elsewhere in the world, department stores dominate. Shopping malls are here to stay and there will be more of them. Most residents love them. They are a symbol of progress in their eyes and a sign that our community is becoming part of the broader global world. Everything in one place. No paying for parking. No one hassling you for money on the street. Earlier and later trading hours. Open all weekend. Loyalty cards. Pensioner specials. Shopping carts. No uneven pavements to walk along. Family-friendly. Free WiFi. Air conditioned in summer. Pretty hard to beat. So, what are the CBDs of the Overstrand to do? Across the world, central business districts (CBDs) are fighting back with the help of progressive town councils. Those who passionately argue that the decline of shopping malls in the UK, the USA and parts of Asia is a result of consumers hankering to
go back to a simpler way of life are wrong. Yes, some people do want to go back to the High Streets and farmer’s markets of old, but the truth is that online sales are driving the decline. In China and the UK, about 20% of all retail is online. In the United States, it is 10%, with many Western European countries also approaching this figure. In South Africa it is 1%. As Jeroen Venema wrote in his master’s paper, ‘Retail transformation and consumer preferences in Paarl and Stellenbosch: CBD versus decentralised mall’ (University of Stellenbosch), “Decentralised, segregated cities with a high car dependency provided the perfect conditions for the retail sector to develop shopping malls on a decentralised scale, which attracted the car-borne consumer perfectly.” Simply put, the more we expand out of our town centres, the more gated communities we build, the more business moves into suburban areas to be closer to their customers and for cheaper rents, the more we remain dependent on cars, the more we aspire to live in a house with a garden, the more we work from home, the more petrol prices increase, the more our fellow citizens become wealthier, the more shopping malls we will have. It’s that simple. Revitalising our CBDs is important to do and must be done, with better signage, improved security, access to WiFi, more plants, friendlier sidewalks, pedestrian-only areas, more parks, more playgrounds, nicely painted buildings, more garbage bins, free parking, specialty shops, and so on. This is not debatable, and our municipality is doing a disservice to its ratepayers, more than five years after the CBD revitalisation report was first published, by dragging its feet on these issues. But, sadly, this won’t stop the decline. It’s a stop gap, for sure. But not the cure. The cure lies in the question: why is it that almost all business owners in the CBD live in the suburbs? Answer: because they either also want the “suburban dream” or there is nowhere for them to stay. Whatever accommodation is available, is for tourists, is extremely expensive, has
TRENDING TOPICS #wedotourism already been converted into business premises or is occupied by long-term owners who tend to be older. CBDs thrive and survive because people live and work there. Tourists love to come to places that are alive in the evening, not dead by 19:00. People who live in the town centre use bicycles or mopeds to move around. Kids walk to school. Specialty shops open. Stores stay open later. Bookshops become community meeting places. Buildings get looked after better. More flowers are grown. The sound of music wafts through the air. Cafés flow out onto the streets.
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Walk around the tourist towns and cities anywhere in the world and they are all alive and kicking with locals. Not only that, but the locals who live in town tend to be younger, more entrepreneurial and more creative. We will only stop the decline of the CBD if we encourage landlords to convert their existing buildings and spaces into apartments. In addition, the municipality must stop allowing houses to be converted into businesses. If we don’t change at some point, more CBD businesses will close or move to the suburbs. Rents will end up dropping and lower priced mass market shops will open. Town will become dirtier. Only the
# area around the ocean will be tourist friendly. So yes, the CBD must reinvent itself. Ironically, this path to salvation lies in going back to the roots of any town’s birth as a place for people to live and work in. If we can do this, the CBD will survive and be better than any shopping mall can ever be. Town centres have soul. A mall will never have this.
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