The fever rises

Bangalore is overwhelmed by the mall mania that hit the town just one year ago. Today , apart from the five existing malls, five more are slated to hit the market in the next two years. With this kind of huge space available, organised retailing scene in city is set to brighten further and the Forum mall will see some real competition. Thomas Sebastian from the retail services group of Chesterton Meghraj Property Consultants gave us an update on the mall scene.

The massive Garuda Mall on Magrath Road, will be open to public from the end of this month, while Sigma Mall on Cunningham Road is expected to be launched in the first week of June. Both malls will have multiplexes as a key attraction. Garuda will have a 1,350-seat, 5-screen multiplex of Inox, a major domestic cineplex player. Sigma will have a 1,200-seat, 4-screen multiplex operated by Fun Republic, a Zee Group company.

In terms of scale, Garuda at seven lakh sft. is comparable with The Forum at six and a half lakh sft. “It includes one lakh sft for a five-star business hotel and we are talking to major hotel players to manage it. This is one of the rare cases of public-private partnership promoted by the Bangalore Mahanagara Palike and Maveric Holdings,” said B.G. Uday, MD, Maveric Holdings, which is setting up the facility on a property owned by the BMP.

Garuda’s 11-storey multilevel and two basement levels of parking will be able to accommodate 1,000 cars. Shoppers’ Stop and Westside will be the anchor tenants in the mall, with 50,000 sft. and 32,000 sft. respectively The mall will also mark the entry of Marks & Spencer into Bangalore.

Sigma has a total built-up space of 2.4 lakh sft, with 1.2 lakh sft of retail space and car park area that can accommodate 320 cars. V.P. Desu, marketing head of the Sigma Group, says Pantaloon and Food Bazaar will be the anchor tenants.

While some malls are ready for occupation, there are also some others which have already got into trouble. Tata Imperial Mall on Residency Road was completed way back in January 2004, but operaions still remain dormant. Purva Mall on Church Street still finds it difficult to get occupants despite having some top brands residing in it. Close proximity to a high street like Brigade Road could be the reason. But on the other end, Suresh S, CEO, Prestige Forum, is quite confident about getting occupants for Eva Mall. Which is an exclusive space for women folk to shop. The success of the Forum could be the factors helping it.

Opening up malls in suburban areas could be the next trend due to the low rentals feels Thomas Sebastian. Sobha Developers coming up with a huge mall in ruins of Minerva Mills in Rajajinagar is one such instance. Spread over a whooping 2.8 million sft, it boasts of housing high-end retail boutiques, ice skating rink, amusement park, hypermarkets, etc. Similarly Brigade Group is planning to build a mall and other property in a huge 38 acre space in Rajajinagar.

Mall Update as on Q4- 2004-05

Issue BG49 Apr05