Liverpool's Metquarter rings the changesThe 150,000 sq ft development has been created by specialist retail developer
Milligan ‘ that has previously developed the Triangle in Manchester
‘ at a cost of £70 million and is expected to bring in up
to £60 million of sales in its first year of opening.
John Milligan, head of Milligan, said the Metquarter was what the city
of Liverpool has needed for some time: ‘It was clear that a lot
of retailers should be in Liverpool but they weren’t here and people
were getting fed up with not being able to shop here and having to go
to the Trafford Centre . They wanted to spend here but couldn’t.
The city is well served at the ordinary end but there has been nothing
at the higher-end.’
The Metquarter has been built on the site of the former Post Office on
Whitechapel in central Liverpool, which was bombed in the Second World
War, and has incorporated aspects of the previous building’s heritage.
Milligan predicted that it will attract five million visitors per year
and help boost the quality of the retail proposition in the surrounding
area.
Everybody around here will benefit. This is the first regeneration project
to open in central Liverpool and I believe it will give a boost to both
the city sand the whole region. The Metquarter has created hundreds of
jobs and will give the North West a dynamic new shopping destination.
‘We could see the start of the designer brands coming to the city.’
He says.
Milligan said the desire to attract specific retailers is the key to
the future success of the Metquarter. He has sought to attract those companies
that did not already have a store in Liverpool and to also encourage them
to provide a different proposition to that found in their other outlets
around the country.
On this basis anchor tenant Flannels has opened its biggest store to
date at 17,500 sq ft spread over three floors and the Armani Exchange
store, which Milligan described as a coup, as it is only its second outlet
after its unit in the Bluewater shopping centre.
This selective approach to tenants has led to the phased-opening of shops
within the development: ‘We could have already let it three-times
over but we want to hold out for just the right tenant mix. Every bit
of research says the driver is the mix of retailers. So you have to hold
you nerve and not let the wrong retailers in. ‘
At its launch the Metquarter is 60 per cent leased and Milligan said
the company is in ‘detailed negotiations’ about another 25
per cent of the space. He revealed that the development will ‘pay
for itself with 85 per cent of the units let.’
The next batch of retailers to open between now and Easter include Hugo
Boss, Kurt Geiger, T.M. Lewin, Hobbs and Parchment Cards. Its leasing
agents are in discussions with many other retailers and Milligan admits
that he would ‘love to have Adidas, Puma or Nike, something like
that in here’.
Although the merchants he is attracting are higher-end, Milligan said
the Metquarter was more about inspirational retailers ‘that have
something different about them’ rather than creating a Bond Street
that is just about luxury.
Unlike other shopping developments Milligan has sought to create more
of a partnership with the tenants in Metquarter through a leasing structure
that involves the retailers paying rent as either a base rate ‘
that is around a third of the best rentals elsewhere in Liverpool ‘
or paying a turnover-related rental.
‘We treat retailers as partners, not as tenants. We want to share
in the risk and need a turnover rent. This means that if there is a brand
that I want in the Metquarter then I could ask them to just give us the
turnover, he suggests.