Zara to open in Melbourne’s Highpoint mall as Amancio Ortega’s wealth hits $57 billion
The push of global retail brands into Australian capital city malls and high streets continues this week with global retail brand Zara putting the finishing touches on its latest store in the expanded Highpoint Shopping Centre in Maribyrnong, which launched today.
Zara, UK fashion giant Topshop and David Jones are anchor tenants in the new Highpoint Fashion Mall, which complements the Fresh Food Market and Eco Mall which opened last year.
It is an Australian first for a shopping centre to house both Zara and Topshop under one roof.
Topshop opened its Highpoint store today with Zara to start trading from next week.
It is part of a $300 million redevelopment of the Centre, with the 30,000 square metre increase in retail space completed in two stages – all of which is now leased.
The completion of the redevelopment leapfrogs Highpoint from 12th biggest shopping centre in Australia to third biggest – behind the Chadstone Shopping Centre in Malvern East and Westfield Fountain Gate in Narre Warren.
The shopping centre, in Melbourne’s west, is co-owned by GPT and the Highpoint Property Group.
Zara forms part of Spanish retail company INDITEX and has more than 1,700 stores across 85 markets.
The other Zara stores in Melbourne are on Bourke Street Mall in the CBD, in Westfield Doncaster and in the Chadstone Shopping Centre.
Zara’s flagship store, which is in Westfield Sydney, opened in April 2011.
Amancio Ortega, the major shareholder of Zara with 60% of the business, was the fastest mover on the annual Forbes magazine rich list released this month.
With his net worth increasing by US$19.5 billion to US$57 billion, he is now the third richest man in the world, after Mexican telecoms mogul Carlos Slim and Microsoft’s Bill Gates.
Ortega also has a real estate portfolio worth about US$4 billion, with properties in Madrid, London, Chicago, San Francisco, and New York.
Born in Spain in 1936, his father a railway worker in Leon, Ortega opened his first Zara store in downtown A Coruña, Galicia, Spain in 1975.
The arrival of both brands to Melbourne’s inner west comes as Colliers International projected that international retail brands would open 300 stores in Australian capital cities in the next few years.