A birthday is always reason to celebrate, and Atterbury’s first retail development in George, the Garden Route Mall, has just turned 10! We sat down for cake with General Manager Rion Olivier

How long have you been with the Garden Route Mall?
Over six years, since May 2009.

What has been the biggest change you’ve seen in shopping patterns in the six years that you’ve been involved?
At the end of the day shoppers want to feel safe and enjoy a clean and attractive, trendy environment. And of course experience the latest offering. Since mid-2009 we’ve introduced 45 new tenancies. That means nearly half of the total of shops (119) at the Garden Route Mall have changed and made space for new brands. We are fortunate to have the critical mass and therefore every tenant contributes to our success and offering. Without singling out any particular store, Dischem was the largest tenant we placed in June 2010, a 1 860 square metre store which makes it an anchor tenant. It was also one of only two new Dischem stores that opened countrywide that year.

Who is the longest-standing and also the newest tenant in the mall?  
There are several long-standing tenants; on the national front these include PicknPay, Foschini group and Woolworths among others who’ve all been there since day one, and in terms of independents the oldest tenants are Verimark, Mellins Optometrist and Out of the Blue ladies boutique. Our newest tenants, who all took beneficial occupation in November 2015, are Pandora, Trappers, Tread & Miller, Three@Boutique and PnP Liquor.

Have you changed your marketing strategy over the time? What works best for you in terms of marketing?
W4W assists us in marketing the mall and tenants. Our annual spring wedding expo has run for the full 10 years of the mall’s existence and is very successful – it appears the public and exhibitors cannot get enough of it. We focus on four main events, the largest being our annual shop-and-win competition where a car or R50 000 in cash is the prize. This attracts a lot of entries since household spending has been under pressure in the last two years. We run a Ladies’ Club and Kiddies’ Club and these are both great ways of engaging the community. Over the past five years we’ve also placed more focus on social media which is an ever-growing and powerful marketing platform.

What makes Garden Route Mall unique in its offering in the area?
The mall family, both tenants and management, share the same common goal and that is to provide our customers with a vibrant shopping experience. We service around 800 000 people in and around George.

What are your biggest challenges as GM of Garden Route Mall?
It’s all about juggling the expectations between the shoppers, tenants and the landlord so that everyone feels that they are getting value for their money. Although we are  successful in having almost a fully let centre, except for our strategic vacancy, it is difficult to lure certain brands to Georges since they see us as “only a coastal town”. We are 440km from Cape Town and 330km from Port Elizabeth, so logistics also play a role. This year was our second five-year renewal cycle. We had about 80 renewals around the same time – October 2015 – when a 30 000 square metre value-and-lifestyle centre opened its doors opposite us.

Did you do anything special for the 10-year birthday celebrations?
We ran a shop-and-win competition with a cash prize of R10 000 that got a lot of traction, and was won by a lady called Sonja Smit. And we also gave each of our tenants and core service providers a bottle of red wine with a special birthday label that we’d created.

What is next for Garden Route Mall?
We are extending the Food Lover’s Market by 2 400 square metres, and next year our Woolworths is also growing by a further 1 300 square metres, so we’re looking forward to that!

If there is anything you could change about Garden Route Mall what would it be?
I’d make it bigger, from its current 53 015 square metres to 60 000… that would strategically place the mall for the next five to ten years to make us dominant in the Southern Cape.