Footfall at designer fashion outlet Kildare Village increases, despite poor retail sales in rest of Ireland

By Christine Eade

So spring has sprung in Kildare Village?

Only the dead bay trees attest to the harshness of the Irish winter at Kildare Village. The rest of the designer outlet shows the geometric horticultural perfection that is standard in Value Retail centres across Europe.

But more significantly, footfall has increased 10% during the first three months of this year, despite days when the snow made opening impossible. Against this background, Ireland’s retail sales are down by 30%.

A celebrity popping in must have helped.

Elizabeth Hurley, the actress turned fashion designer, opened a pop-up shop in a corner shop opposite Levi’s to sell her range of bikinis.

She was surrounded by an excited crowd as she toured the centre on 11 March and, on the following day, hosted a lunch in a nearby unit, where photographer Terry O’Neill was staging an exhibition of portraits of film stars.

Any more good news?

Five new retailers are about to sign licences, and this will mean that Kildare is fully let for the first time since it opened four years ago, set amid medieval abbey ruins and the affluent horse-breeding country an hour’s dive from Dublin.

Value Retail’s chairman, Scott Malkin, expects 2.5 million shoppers to visit Kildare Village this year — an increase of between 10% and 15% on last year, which itself was up by 13% on the previous year.

What makes Kildare so special?

Malkin believes that Kildare thrives while the rest of Ireland struggles because the number of overseas visitors has more than doubled since opening.

He explains: “It takes time to get known in the tourism market. We are more likely to be discovered in China, rather than necessarily in Dublin. When these people arrive in Dublin they have already decided what they want to do before they set off.

It is not a matter of how good one is or how strong the offer. What counts is word of mouth before they start out.”

“Guilt-free shopping” sounds good.

Malkin still has to keep the wives of horse breeders and other locals happy by offering space to luxury retailers to sell at a discount in what he calls “guilt-free shopping”.

Several of the luxury retailers have no full-price store in Ireland. Anya Hindmarsh, the handbag designer, has decided to stay on a permanent basis after taking a temporary shop, in what is her only store in Ireland.

Kildare is second only to Bicester Village in Oxfordshire, as Value Retail’s most successful outlet out of nine throughout western Europe. The sales density in Kildare is €600/sq ft — half of Bicester, but twice the rest of Europe.

Malkin concludes: “We take Ireland extremely seriously. It is an important market for us.”

As Hurley shuts up shop later this year, she may think the same.

Source : www.propertyweek.com, 26.03.10