Welcome, dear reader, to the Retail Space Europe Yearbook 2008, the first collaboration of the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) and REP Real Estate Publishers. On the following 580 pages we will provide you with an overview of recent real estate topics, locations, projects and industry trends as well as a variety of Corporate Stories, Who’s Who profiles and maps.
The importance of retailing and retail real estate to the developing countries of the enlarged Europe, the CEE and beyond demonstrates the sheer power of shopping and the importance that it can have for an economy. Retailing has been central to the accelerated evolution of the real estate markets in Russia, Romania, Bulgaria and Turkey for instance.
Retailing is widely used – offi cially or unoffi cially – as a barometer of the health of an economy and one of the earliest and most direct indications of consumer sentiment. Furthermore, retailing is, self-evidently, a medium through which consumers can express their tastes and preferences.
This perhaps gives the retail process a wider, more signifi cant cultural purpose. At a time when communities are not wholly defi ned by the geographic area in which people live, because work, other interests and the ability to travel tend to take them elsewhere, the shopping center is beco ming an alternative communal heart.
Although shopping centers and their developers and consultants are for most of the time engaged in intense competition with each other, here too is a community that has much to gain from sharing information and best practices. A process engendered by the ICSC. It is also a cause that we believe is furthered by the publication of this yearbook, which explores in detail the current state of retailing in the wider Europe.
Book publishing is teamwork. Therefore a fi rst ‘thank you’ goes to every contributor, including the huge team of authors who have worked on this book, as well all the others involved. Another big ‘thank you’ is for all who have supported this book, either through advertising, fact sheets or company profiles. Without this support this yearbook would not be possible.
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