CREJ

Fitness gets retail back in shape INSIDE I t seems that everyone still is trying to find the next big thing for retail. Some land- lords focus on assembling food halls, others look at a range of entertainment concepts from virtual reality to axe-throwing. What if the answer to retail’s recent sluggishness is a trip to the gym? According to our recent research of over 6,000 fitness tenant move-ins, we’ve identified that this trend, and this larger cultural shift to a focus on wellness and healthier lifestyles, may be what retail needs to get back into shape. Since 2010, the number of fit- ness move-ins in retail locations has grown by 23.5%. This is a trend that will continue: it’s expected that the number of fitness locations will increase 8.7% to 120,700 loca- tions by 2024, according to IBIS World. These numbers translate into very real benefits for shopping cen- ter landlords as 47% of consumers indicated that they are motivated to visit a shopping center if it has a fitness or wellness tenant. Fitness consumers also tend to be higher earners with an average household income of $80,300. This means that savvy landlords can leverage their tenant mix to take advantage of cotenant synergies by placing well- ness-focused retail tenants near their fitness center tenants. As the number of fitness locations have grown over the last decade, so have the types of fitness offer- ings. In our research, we decided to break fitness concepts into seven different groupings: traditional, high-intensity interval training, spinning, dance, personal train- ing, combat fitness, and Pilates and yoga. We found that specialized boutique studio concepts, often Driving forces and factors behind Colorado’s private capital retail investment market Investment market The pros, cons and decision-making compo- nents of securing the right food hall concept Food hall intricacies PAGE 16 A litmus test to help identify tenants that cultivate the elusive retail experience Chasing experiences PAGE 14 Please see Page 17 November 2019 Taylor Coyne Research manager, U.S. Retail, JLL PAGE 8 Low-priced gym models, like the Vasa Fitness at the Summer Valley Shopping Center in Aurora (pictured above), are growing in popularity, accounting for hundreds of retail move-ins within the last 10 years as landlords are attracted to the recession-proof nature of these low-cost membership models.