New supply of retail space up 72% last year to nearly 6 mn sq ft: Cushman

The new supply of retail space in shopping malls increased 72 per cent last year to 59.48 lakh square feet across eight major cities to meet rising demand from retailers, according to Cushman & Wakefield.

In 2023, as many as 11 shopping malls became operational, covering 59,48,395 square feet of space across the top eight cities.

In the previous year, nine malls came into eight markets, totalling 34,49,222 square feet area.

Hyderabad witnessed the completion of three shopping malls, while Pune and Chennai had two each. One shopping mall each came up in Mumbai Metropolitan Region, Delhi-NCR, Bengaluru and Ahmedabad. No fresh supply was seen in Kolkata.

With 59 lakh square feet of mall commencing operations across the top 8 cities in India, Cushman said the year 2023 saw the biggest supply addition in the post-COVID world.

In 2019, the same cities witnessed a new supply addition of around 50 lakh square feet of Grade-A and B+ malls.

Saurabh Shatdal, Managing Director, Capital Markets and Head of Retail at India, C&W, said, "With a surge in supply of new malls in Q4, the total mall supply across top 8 cities in 2023 surpassed the highs of 2019 by a nearly million square feet. This reflects the strong interest from retailers in entering or expanding into the Indian market, fuelled by evolving consumer preferences, shifting consumption patterns and a supportive business environment".

He expects this momentum to continue.

In the previous three years (2020-22), the consultant pointed out that the annual average footprint of malls that were operational stood below 30 lakh square feet.

"...developers shied away from this asset class that was worst hit due to the pandemic," it said.

Post-COVID, the consultant said the retailers experienced a dearth of good quality retailing space as most Grade-A malls experienced tight vacancies.