A new research has found that the United Arab Emirates is one of the most attractive markets for retailers today. According to CBRE’s latest report called “How Active are Retailers Globally,” the UAE shares its 22nd spot on the list with three other countries. Similar to it, Norway, Denmark and Ireland are also targeted by 10% of the retailers each.
Furthermore, the United Arab Emirates is among the most attractive markets for retailers outside of Europe. The UAE is only surpassed by a small number of countries like China, Singapore and Hong Kong.
In addition, the UAE is also the most popular retail market in the entire MENA region. On a local level, the country is followed by Saudi Arabia, which takes the 17th position on the global ranking. About 7% of retailers were found to target Qatar’s market in 2014. That makes it 32nd on the global list and 3rd on the regional one. Oman and Pakistan can also be seen further down the ranking at the 46th and 55th spots, respectively.
Germany is the most popular global retail market this year. It surpassed other attractive markets like France (2), the UK (3), Austria (4) and China (5). Germany attracts retailers from all over the world with the fact that its market consists not of one, but of twenty big cities. As a result, over 40% of global retailers plan to open a new store there this year. The country is even more popular among retailers from Europe. About 70% of them intend to take advantage of the benefits of the market there.
U.S. retailers, however, were found to plan the largest expansion in 2014. Nearly half of them have shared that they will open new stores over the next few months. Still, most of them prefer to focus on the local market and will not expand outside the U.S. Still, compared to previous years, retailers from the country have become more open to a global expansion. That is mainly because the competition and maturity at the U.S. market has greatly increased. Unsurprisingly, the most popular global location for U.S. retailers is Germany.
Top 10 target retail markets for 2014:
- Germany
- France
- United Kingdom
- Austria
- China
- Switzerland
- Belgium
- Spain
- Italy
- Check Repubic
- 22 United Arab Emirates
According to the report, the percentage of large-scale retail expansions has jumped impressively compared to previous years due to the rising confidence.
