![\"Unknown\"](\"http:\/\/s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/cjp-rbi-estatesgazette\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/Unknown.jpeg\")
<\/p>\nThe UK has taken the top spot as the most popular destination for retailers looking to expand their store presence in Europe, the Middle East and Africa in 2017.<\/p>\n
According to research by CBRE, 65% of retailers surveyed cited the UK as their target market for expansion.<\/p>\n
The core markets of Western Europe are top of retailers\u2019 agenda as the most popular destinations for expanding their shop network in 2017, despite the political and economic uncertainty in Europe.<\/p>\n
The UK leads the way as the most attractive retail market in the region and is closely followed by France (43%) Germany (38%) and UAE (24%), with Spain, the Netherlands and Hungary attracting 19% of respondents, to make up the top five most popular markets for retailer expansion.<\/p>\n
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CBRE\u2019s research report \u2013 How Active are Retailers in EMEA? \u2013 found that 51% of international retailers surveyed intend to open up to five stores across EMEA by the end of 2017.<\/p>\n
However, the number of retailers with large-scale expansion plans in 2017 is expected to slow, with 70% of retailers indicating that they expect to open 10 stores or fewer, reflecting a more cautious approach to their growth plans. Street shops and regional shopping centres remain the most popular formats for expansion, with more than 80% of retailers choosing these methods of growth.<\/p>\n
The survey also found that the biggest concerns for retailer expansion in 2017 are real estate cost escalation, which was cited by 57% of retailers. This was closely followed by lack of quality retail space (51%).<\/p>\n
Andrew Phipps, head of UK & EMEA retail research at CBRE, said: \u201cOur research shows that retailers are committed to opening new stores and that the UK remains an attractive destination for retailer expansion. However, finding quality retail space in the right location remains a challenge and this has been a consistent rental driver in some of the most prime retail areas across EMEA pushing some of the traditional European retail centres to large rental growth throughout 2016. There is little expectation from retailers that this lack of quality space in key Western markets is likely to decrease in 2017.\u201d<\/p>\n
The survey also revealed that 81% of the retailers surveyed believe that the growth of online retail will not affect their physical store expansion plans in Europe.<\/p>\n
While a small number of retailers believe that the internet will reduce the need for a large store network, they also believe that changes in consumer shopping will allow retailers to generate the same level of sales with fewer stores. This highlights that the role of the physical store is changing, with more stores being used as an opportunity for brands to display experiential retail.<\/p>\n
When it comes to investing in digital technology to improve customer service, 78% of retailers have, or are looking at, implementing an integrated store and social media platform. Some 58% of retailers agreed that the use of in-store technology is growing in importance. More surprisingly, a third of retail brands indicated that they have or are looking at implementing interactive displays and fitting rooms, a trend that looks set to be popular in 2017.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The UK has taken the top spot as the most popular destination for retailers looking to expand their store presence in Europe, the Middle East and Africa in 2017. According to research by CBRE, 65% of retailers surveyed cited the UK as their target market for expansion. The core markets of Western Europe are top […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2697","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9PjAq-Hv","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/poseidon-gp.com\/property\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2697","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/poseidon-gp.com\/property\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/poseidon-gp.com\/property\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poseidon-gp.com\/property\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poseidon-gp.com\/property\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2697"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/poseidon-gp.com\/property\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2697\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/poseidon-gp.com\/property\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poseidon-gp.com\/property\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poseidon-gp.com\/property\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}