Liberty Center owners: Traffic was 20-30% below expectations in December

The representatives of Northern Irish Mivan real estate developer, which owns Liberty Center mall in Bucharest’s Trafic Greu area, state that during December daily traffic amounted to 22,000-23,000 visitors, 20-30% below expectations, partly because of the crisis that is set to impact consumer spending, too. “The crisis’ weight was felt in consumption behaviour, though there were no massive layoffs or revenue drops, but the gloomy outlooks for the future pushed people to be wary about expenses. Traffic in Liberty Center was 20-30% lower than expected, a tendency I understand was felt at the level of the entire shopping centre market,” Marius Barbu, retail development manager of Mivan, told ZF. By comparison, in the first three days after the October launch, the shopping centre registered traffic of 160,000 visitors, namely a daily average of more than 50,000 people. “People were more conservative, they treaded the paths they knew, experimenting less,” added Barbu. Mivan representative did not provide any figures related to sales posted within the project, saying the firm only levies fixed rents, and not sales percentages, so that it does not have access to tenants’ turnovers. “Major brands, such as Marks & Spencer, enjoy awareness, but we also have new retailers, especially in a franchise system, which are facing difficulties in brand promotion. We’ll carry out a marketing campaign of around one million euros this year and we hope we’ll reach satisfactory traffic around Easter,” said Barbu.