Liberty House at Windward Mall is just one of many retail stores that will find themselves fighting for Hawai‘is retail dollars. Industry experts forecast flat sales this year with all the competition.
Posted on: Sunday, January 28, 2001
Retailers prepare to battle for share of consumer dollars
By Andrew Gomes
Advertiser Staff Writer
Slice. Slice. Slice.
The year in Hawai‘i retailing is going to be a knife-like duel over thinning pieces of the retail pie, local industry analysts predict.
Statewide retail spending last year was $14.8 billion through October, compared to $13.1 billion for the same 10-month period in 1999, a 13 percent increase, according to the most recent data from the state Tax Department.
The state Department of Business, Economic Development & Tourism forecasts 2 percent growth each year through 2005. But some industry experts expect sales will be flat this year, as a significant number of new retail stores compete for their share of shoppers.
Fred Noa, vice president and leasing specialist at local real estate firm Chaney, Brooks & Co., said he believes retail sales this year will be relatively flat. "If anything, they’ll probably drop off a little bit. I think the public is just going to be a much more discerning consumer this year," he said.
"The reason there’s no growth is you have so much retail coming out, and there’s so much pressure to do discounting," said local retail analyst Stephany Sofos. "What’s happened is the consumers have been taught through sales and coupon deals to demand value. Profit margins are getting thinner, and it (discounting) is cutting across the sales volume."
Waging much of the battle for customer spending will be a large number of shopping centers that are expanding or have come under new ownership recently.
Victoria Ward Centers this year is adding 156,000 square feet of new retail space - one-and-a-half times bigger than Ward Warehouse, and one-tenth the size of Ala Moana Center.
Windward Mall will open theaters that should attract more retail.
Kapolei and Iwilei (Dole Cannery) also are expected to increase retail offerings.
Restaurant Row and Pearl Highlands Center are under new ownership, which should turn up the competition.
On the Big Island, more retail is coming on line at the Kings’ Shops and the Shops at Mauna Lani.
On Maui, stores are opening at the Shops At Wailea. On Kaua‘i, Po‘ipu Shopping Village is expanding.
Several big, stand-alone stores scheduled to open this year also will be carving up their shares of the pie, including Wal-Mart and Home Depot, as well as a possible Pier 1 on Maui, and Hilo Hattie and DFS Galleria in Waikiki.
Douglass Smoyer, president of Honolulu-based Retail Strategies Inc., said in a recent presentation to the International Council of Shopping Centers that fewer retailers have been interested in coming to Hawai‘i because of the booming economy on the Mainland - something that is now changing.
Smoyer said talk about Hawai‘i being over-retailed is true in some segments. But there are still areas lacking such as entertainment retailers like Build A Bear, home furnishings like Crate & Barrel, and moderate-priced retailers like J. Crew.
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