Walking around Kuwaiti malls (Avenues in particular), you would see that many multinational retailers are represented in Kuwait. There was huge boom in terms of the number of retailers being represented in Kuwait, a boom that can be mainly attributed to Al Shaya Group. In the past year, we have seen the likes of P.F.Changs, American Eagle, Pottery Barn (soon), Pinkberry, among others arrive in Kuwait. The Kuwaiti consumer has a big appetite and a big spending power, making the Kuwaiti market an attractive one.
CB Richard Ellis published a report that discussed the retail business, and the destinations of retail giants’ expansions. The report pulled its data from 294 retail company in 69 countries. The result was that there has been a shift of focus from the developed markets (US, Europe) to emerging markets (Asia, Middle East), which is understandable as the countries are growing at much higher rates, and their population’s income is growing creating demand for retail outlets. Kuwait ranks as the 11th most important destination in the world, and Kuwait City ranks in the 18th spot in terms of cities. The rank is based on the percentage of the respondants that have presence in these countries/cities. What is notable as well is the jump in ranking among Middle Eastern cities, as Riyadh jumped from the 25th place to the 14th, Jeddah from the 26th to the 15th, and Kuwait City from the 28th to the 18th. The rankings of Kuwait City, Riyadh, and Jeddah all surpass that of Las Vegas, Barcelona, and Istanbul.
My question is are Middle Eastern cities more important than Las Vegas, Barcelona, and Istanbul (which attract millions of tourists annually) in the point of view of retailers, or do these cities have more domestic outlets and do not rely on big name retailers?
No comments:
Post a Comment