Fears for Freo retail as Myer considers skipping town

The City of Fremantle could become a ghost town as unhappy retailers pack their wares and leave port city.

Council bosses made a dash to Melbourne recently in a bid to convince retailing giant Myer not to close its doors when its lease comes up for renewal.

Myer has been in Fremantle for 40 years, and although it is in a four-level building, only two floors are used for trading.

In recent months a national retailers including Betts shoes, Jeanswest, Jay Jays, Millers and Rockman’s have all close their shops. Local operators like the Creative Native gallery has downsized to smaller premises. Myer closing would be a major blow to the city, which has only four anchor tenants – Myer, Coles, Woolworth and Target – in place and 800 residents living in the CBD.

Rents range from about $1200 a square metre for prime retail space on High Street Mall to about $500 a square metres about 100 metres away.

“Fremantle is heading where everybody else in retails in going. The Woolstores shopping centre is struggling and so are arcades and strips shops outside the major tourist track,” says Colliers International leasing executive Anthony Unmack.

Fremantle attracts hoards of foreign and national tourists and day-trippers from Perth. It is the most visited city in Western Australia after Perth for international travellers. It has a well-used café strip on South Street, well-patronised markets, heritage-listed prison and many fine heritage buildings that continually entice thousands of visitors.

“There is a well-worn tourist trail along High Street, Adelaide Street and the café strip up to the market, which is humming to the hilt weekend. But the foot traffic doesn’t deviate away from those areas, and retail is suffering,” Unmack says.

While Fremantle mayor Brad Pettitt lead a five-man delegation to Melbourne to negotiate a package to keep Myer in town, the council is acutely aware of declining state of its shops and commissioned a study into the retail sector resulting in the just-released Retail Model Plan 2011.

“The vacancy rate of 7% in the city centre precinct must be maintained or reduced though skilful leasing and business development strategies,” the report said.

These strategies include encouraging a better mix of retail to encourage more fashion and home wares, developing a management system that runs a fund for marketing and communications, a listing of vacant premises and a desirable tenant hit list. It will have performance measures including what increases in business have occurred and what the pedestrian counts are.

Already the council has changed planning policy to permit mixed commercial and residential projects up to eight levels high in the run-down east end of town.

Andrew Eastic, Fremantle Council’s economic, marketing and development manager, agrees that the area is in decline.

“Myer’s 40-year lease is about to expire, and we are working on keeping them here. Bett’s have left after 119 years of trading in Fremantle, and there are a lot of empty shops. We acknowledge this and commissioned the Retail Model Plan. We will implement many of the excellent recommendations in order to bring Fremantle back to being a retailing centre,” Eastic says.