Scotts Square unveils new line-up of tenants

Singapore

AFTER an exodus of more than eight tenants over the last six months, luxury shopping mall Scotts Square is poised for a revival with a fresh line-up of at least five new tenants.

Celebrated British fashion house Alexander McQueen will open a flagship store in a street-facing unit on the mall's ground floor - its second outlet in Singapore - while 186-

year-old Belgian luxury leather goods brand Delvaux will open its maiden Singapore store in an adjacent unit on the same floor, Scotts Square said in a statement on Wednesday.

Upstairs, footwear, handbags and accessories specialist Pedder Group will unveil a brand new retail concept across a 20,000 sq ft unit on the second floor.

The brand's largest offering of its type in Singapore and the region, the store will carry over 200 brands in a space divided into six zones, including an On Pedder zone for its range of international and emerging designer brands, an On Pedder Men's Store, a Market Place space for creative collaborations and pop-ups as well as a Cool Kids section featuring apparel and footwear for children from two to 12 years old.

All three stores are expected to open in the third quarter of the year.

From May 2015, the mall will also see two new-to-market food and beverage concepts: Hong Kong-style roast goose specialist the London Fat Duck and Time & Flow Champagne on basement one.

The former is a new collaboration between Japanese restaurant operators the Akashi group and the Fei Siong Group, which owns food businesses like the Malaysia Boleh! food courts and the EAT chain of casual noodle bars. Time & Flow Champagne, meanwhile, is a wine salon and academy run in partnership with Sarment Group, with a focus on premium organic champagnes.

Both concepts will take over the 3,200 sq ft unit recently vacated by Delicious, a casual eatery by Malaysia's E&O Group.

"As a new brand, we wanted to be in Orchard Road so that we can reach out to a wider audience more quickly," said Akashi's Mervyn Goh, "and since Scotts Square is getting a fresh look, we thought it was timely to come on board."

On whether the recent outflow of tenants was the cause for any hesistance when signing the lease, he said: "It doesn't worry me. If our food is good, people will come."

The new changes come amidst a string of departures of brands such as Ginza Sushi Ichi, Arossa Wine & Grill, apparel retailers Anne Fontaine and Bread & Butter and luxury watch retailer Sincere Fine Watches, leaving prominently empty store fronts in the Orchard Road mall between last October and March this year.

The revamp follows those by other Orchard Road mall operators. Centrepoint announced a S$$50 million makeover last month, after recent exits by key tenants such as Marks and Spencer and Cold Storage.

"With the latest tenants, the mall has an overall tenant commitment rate of close to 90 per cent," said Stephanie Tay, group general manager of marketing of Wheelock Properties (Singapore) Ltd. The mall will also introduce seasonal campaigns and innovative pop-up concepts, such as its K+ exhibition space created in collaboration with Kinetic Singapore that will feature a changing line-up of international and local artists from now till August 2015.

While the new brands are consistent with the mall's upmarket position, whether they are strong enough to pull in the crowds remains to be seen, said retail expert Amos Tan, a retail management lecturer at Singapore Polytechnic.

A luxury positioning may have worked well for the mall before, but most mid to high-end brands are now well represented in nearby Ion Orchard, he observed. Scotts Square is further disadvantaged by its small size relative to neighbouring shopping malls as this limits the number of brands and variety of merchandise it can contain. "Consumers like to shop in a mall where you have many brands. People tend not to like to hop around different malls for different brands," he added.