Café-style tenants becoming major drawcards for Sunshine Coast retail cenres: HTW

The retail market on the Sunshine Coast has generally reflected the overall retail markets of south-east Queensland over the past three year period, according to the latest Herron Todd White (HTW) commercial report.

The valuation firm took a look at the changing faces in the retail sector across the nation. 

"We have seen very strong yield compression for national tenant type holdings appealing to a larger regional style market," the report noted.

"We have also seen some investors begin to change their overall offer for stand alone holdings where appropriate and there’s been a re-positioning of some centres, primarily with a new focus towards food and entertainment offerings."

Several small neighbourhood centres in secondary overall locations have placed café-style tenants as primary tenants and have used these as the main draw to fill surrounding tenancies if the café tenant gets a strong following.

There has been a mix of hits and misses with this approach to date, which mainly fluctuates on the quality of the food tenant.

A former bulky goods type retail centre in Maroochydore opposite the southern entrance to Sunshine Plaza has also begun to reposition along the same lines, it noted.

"Recent placement of a health food supermarket, gym and two café-style operators has begun to change the dynamic of the centre, which had significant vacancies over the past three year period."

HTW noted the Ocean Street precinct had remained strong over the past two years, which is another area that has centred on a food and entertainment offering.

The Sunshine Plaza extension is also continuing which will add a David Jones and Big W to the overall offer.

The expansion will see the centre increase to 107,000 square metres with a further 100 specialties as well as a renovation of the existing facility and addition of 1,500 car parks.