Mark Harvey, at RivingtonHark, wrote an interesting piece on repositioning retail, or as he terms it, “pivoting” retail to new uses. Mark writes “nowhere, is this more needed than with retail assets that find themselves with a diminished role in a changing consumer environment”. These assets would be best placed to pivot towards leisure and social.

The article provides examples of leisure and social uses, from traditional ones such as bowling alleys and cinemas, to newer “competitive leisure” concepts such as escape rooms and axe throwing experiences.

Mark details the benefits of operating a leisure and social business alongside retail...it increases the “dwell time” of consumers at the neighbouring retail offering...“providing additional footfall for retailers to capitalise on, and increasing usage of ancillary assets such as car parks.”

Obviously “a pivot towards leisure and social is likely to need capital investment”. There may be additional opportunities for owners such as residential redevelopment or “a repurposing towards last-mile logistics” particularly for out-of-town retail parks. Although rents have to stack up.

RivingtonHark’s repurpose of Castle Quarter in Norwich has proven how successful a pivot towards a more leisure and social focused destination can be, where 90,000 sq ft (around 50% of the asset’s space) is now let to social, leisure and lifestyle operators.