Adamescu changes Unirea's strategy to compete with malls

After the retail market boom, which saw all players on the clothing, footwear and cosmetics market fight for a place in new shopping centres or in those about to open, it is Unirea Shopping Center’s turn to “unfreeze” the rental market. Here is its offer: a space that generates the biggest traffic, located in a central area.

Unirea’s original strategy was to attract several small stores, many of which are no-name stores, in order to create a continuous client flow, consisting of Bucharest inhabitants, as well as of people outside Bucharest.

The store was not thought out as a mall, but rather as space for retail, but changes on the market of real estate transactions prompted the Adamescu family, owners of the shopping centre, to change their development strategy in the context of a consumer spending contraction, which implicitly entailed tighter competition over clients.

“Models were blended. In addition to the many small stores located on the centre’s sides, which do not differ very much from those in a mall located on the city outskirts, they also brought in a small number of well-known retailers, which occupy larger spaces and post higher sales,” believes Stefan Liute, strategy director of branding company Grapefruit.

In the absence of massive investments in renovating and in setting up stores, Unirea Shopping Center made available large spaces to well-known international brands, such as Body Shop, Lee Cooper, and, more recently, to Zara, Douglas and Mango, with the latter to open a 230 square-metre store within the centre in late September.

Adamescu has thus allocated more than 10% of the overall sales area to large players in order to compete with Bucharest malls, whose main target has been to create as complex a tenant mix as possible.

“Up until two years ago the offer was not in line with the latest trends. Now Unirea appears to be catching up. I started to come here more often since Zara opened. I go into the centre, as well, because I can find everything I need here. I think it has become competition to the malls,” says Catalina Nastase, a client passing by the future Mango store, who thinks starting in October, this will be her next shopping destination.

Although the Adamescu family signed rental contracts with large foreign retailers for the central part of the centre, there are several empty spaces in on the sides of the centre.

Carmen Adamescu, manager of Unirea Shopping Center, could not be contacted for comment.