The ECE Retail Meeting was first held in 2003 and has since developed into the largest industry meeting of its kind in Europe. This year’s discussions and panel talks focused, among other things, on the diverging development in the retail sector with a continuing high number of insolvencies on the one hand and many successful expanding concepts on the other, as well as on the great importance of future-oriented investments and partnership-based cooperation between tenants and investors for the sustainable success of retail locations, and the success factors for the stable performance of shopping centers.
“The large number of participants at our Retail Meeting shows us once again how important it is to work in partnership and have a shared understanding of the opportunities and challenges in the industry in order to successfully move the retail real estate sector forward and develop it for the future,” said Joanna Fisher, CEO of ECE Marketplaces, at the Retail Meeting in Hamburg.
“Successful examples of best practice and the positive developments in the shopping center segment are a good basis for driving forward the necessary transformation together,” she added.
ECE Marketplaces has also proven this by once again increasing its letting performance in the centers it operates in 2024 and concluding around 1,200 leases for a total rental space of around 350,000 sq m by the end of May alone – an increase of around 10% compared to the already very successful prior-year period. Tenant turnover again developed positively in the first quarter of 2024 with a growth of 4.6%, as did visitor frequency with an increase of 3.5%.
