Opening marathon in Respublika Park shopping mall: International brands enter the Ukrainian market despite the war

Olena Yatsenko, Director of the Leasing Department of the capital’s Respublika Park shopping mall, spoke about the peculiarities of the season, the difficulties of negotiating with international brands and the ambitious plans for the development of the shopping mall.

Despite the complex military situation in Ukraine, Respublika Park shopping mall continues to actively attract both well-known Ukrainian and international operators. In particular, the first store of the Polish brand Ochnik appeared in the shopping mall — the first in Kyiv. Other well-known and favourite brands such as Emporio Armani Sport (EA7), Crocs, Itis Flowers Cafe, Cabanchi.com, Cher17 and others have also appeared. Olena Yatsenko, Director of the Leasing Department of Kyiv shopping mall, shared how they managed to attract them and why international companies choose Respublika Park shopping mall.

— Recently, we have seen the opening of new stores in Respublika Park shopping mall. What brands and stores have opened recently? How do they attract the customers’ attention?

— Our team has been preparing for the new season for a long time and carefully, attracting new, interesting tenants who will make our tenant mix even more powerful to provide visitors with a wide choice and convenient shopping and leisure facilities. Since July, we have been on a marathon of new openings. The marathon began with the opening of a store of the international lingerie brand Calvin Klein Underwear, as well as Sister’s Aroma, which opened in the showroom format.

In August, the marathon continued with the opening of a multi-brand children’s store called Kim Kids. We are actively working on expanding the children’s area, and Kim Kids is a bright result of our efforts, with other interesting “children’s” store openings to come. Among the major openings in August, it is worth noting a new offline player is the Click store, which previously operated exclusively online. We are very glad when retailers choose Respublika Park shopping mall to open new unique formats.

Continuing the topic of unique formats, August pleased visitors with a full-size store of favourite brands Dyson & KitchenAid — the first store of this type in Ukraine, as well as the opening of a unique space by Ukrainian designers Blushhh.

The Orsay store was opened on the last weekend of August, which can be considered an important step towards meeting the needs of such a niche customer as women aged 35+. We focus on the diversity of age groups, and this is an important part of our strategy. We are also looking forward to opening a Marsego store, which is a Ukrainian brand that is confidently conquering the market and has a very wide audience of connoisseurs.

We are planning to open a new furniture store Mood soon — a young, progressive brand from the already well-known Blanche chain, which will become an adornment of our home furnishings area due to its interior solutions and design.

In the first half of September, we expect to open the Mango store. This event is important for us, as the opening will take place in the latest concept and will be the first store in a long time to be opened directly by the Spanish office. The Agreement was signed before February 24, 2022, but the renovation work stopped when the full-scale war started. But for us, this is not just a resumption of work, it is a successful start. We started a dialogue with the Spanish office of Mango, found arguments and convinced them of the benefits of investing in a new store format in our shopping mall.

In general, our strategy envisages a real marathon of store openings. We are planning to open more than 25 new stores in the shopping mall by the end of the first quarter of next year.

— How do you manage to convince international brands to enter the Ukrainian market during the war?

— Speaking about communication with new brands, for example, Mango, it was a long-term story that lasted more than a year and a half. It was indeed difficult, but it is always the result, not the process, that is evaluated, and the result is successful. 

We managed to convince them that it was safe to open with us, even with all the events taking place in Ukraine. We rely on bold and important decisions, believing that success follows the bold. We combine our perseverance and expertise with the successful performance of our shopping malls. In general, this symbiosis has allowed us to make strong and bright discoveries. We are making good progress, even in difficult times, and we do it with great commitment.

— What are the current trends in retail? Have they changed compared to previous years due to the martial law?

— Let’s begin with traffic analysis. Traffic metrics are consistently showing growth month on month. What is particularly important for us is the significant growth in weekday traffic and the corresponding reduction in the difference between weekend and weekday traffic. Recent internal research has shown that we have a lot of new visitors to the shopping mall, mostly internally displaced persons who move from troubled regions to Kyiv. We are actively working to attract them and ensure their loyalty to Respublika Park shopping mall.

Obviously, trends in visitor behaviour have changed. Nowadays, they are looking not just for shopping, but also for entertainment that will make them maximise their time spent in the shopping mall. It is important for us that our mall is a place where you can get the most out of your shopping experience in a safe and comfortable environment.

Due to the air raid alerts and limited time, visitors want to satisfy all their needs quickly and efficiently in one place, and Respublika Park is just such a place.

We also notice a decrease in the influence of the seasonal factor. Since March, we have seen an active growth in attendance and turnover, and this trend continues.

— How does Respublika Park shopping mall cooperate with its tenants to create a comfortable and safe atmosphere under martial law? What measures have been implemented to ensure the safety of customers and visitors?

— Compliance with the SES regulations on visitor safety is an important part of our work. One of the important conditions is a large car park located under the shopping mall building. This is a place that we recommend using for shelter if necessary. When we have high attendance, especially during events and promotions, we always inform visitors that they can stay in the car park during the air raid alert. But the safest shelter is Teremky underground station.

What is interesting to note, returning to the trends: the last 3-4 months have been characterised by the return of visitors to the shopping mall in full after the air raid alert period. Previously, some visitors did not return after the end of the alert, but now almost everyone is ready to return to the mall for shopping and entertainment, having waited out the danger in a shelter. This is an extremely positive trend for us, which shows that visitors trust the security measures in the shopping mall and want to come back here.

— Do you plan any promotions or initiatives to entertain visitors or charity events?

— We constantly organise various events aimed at different groups of visitors. Our goal is to attract not only Kyiv residents but also new customers from different regions. We try to promote our shopping mall by means of exciting events full of emotions. For example, the wind tunnel in Respublika Park shopping mall is a unique emotional and relaxing experience. We are glad that we managed to implement this project with our Latvian partners. It is currently a very popular birthday present — both children and adults are actively involved in the new sport.

We are introducing new formats that meet the modern style and interests of the young audience, both with and without children. It is important for us to meet the expectations and interests of our main target audience aged 18 to 45.

At the moment, we can see that family entertainment is very well received by visitors. Together with the Neopolis amusement park, we organise interesting themed events, introduce promotional offers for rides on the event day so that as many children as possible can visit the amusement park, and of course, we always support charity formats.

We also successfully cooperate with young Ukrainian artists to create interesting, modern events. Last weekend before the start of the new school year, for example, we successfully held a festival for children called TikTok Day. This event was attended by visitors from Kyiv and the suburbs. It was an extremely exciting and emotional day: The children met their favourite bloggers and artists, had fun at the gaming locations from our partners, rode the rides to their heart’s content and, of course, bought everything they needed for school.

Our main goal is to evoke positive emotions in our customers. We are always working to ensure that the events taking place in our space make sense for both buyers and sellers — our tenants. For the upcoming season, we have prepared exciting events that we will implement together with our tenant partners. These events will be full of emotions, they will stimulate sales and have a charitable aspect. After all, together we are bringing the Victory closer.

— What are the plans and prospects for the development of Respublika Park shopping mall in the near future, in particular, with regard to the new season?

— We have several interesting features in the shopping mall. In addition to the usual galleries, we have a large number of frontage premises in the Street Retail format. With this format used, we can provide a variety of services for our visitors: the ability to wash a car, make an appointment with a doctor or have tests done at a medical centre, pick up or send parcels — all of which makes staying in our shopping mall more comfortable. And entrepreneurs can work independently, setting their own working hours.

The main task and action plan of our team can be summed up in one word: “service”: both in B2C and B2B.

Yuliia Shchaslyva, General Director of Respublika Park shopping mall:

“We are actively working to make visiting the shopping mall as comfortable and enjoyable as possible for our guests by introducing new services. One of the aspects of these services is a mobile application with the function of building routes, searching for shops, services and finding a car in the car park. We have also installed charging stations for electric vehicles.

Our team continues to create a “platform” where every business can feel unique and profitable. We strive to create an environment for innovation and support for various business formats. We are also improving our services to ensure maximum comfort for visitors. Our goal is to create a high-quality and interesting offer for our customers in difficult times when new opportunities and challenges arise.

Now we, Ukrainians, are moving forward like a locomotive, due to mutual support. We are living in an interesting, but challenging period, and the most important thing is our reaction to it.

Every crisis offers great opportunities, and it is important to use them properly.”

Info. Respublika Park is a super-regional shopping mall, which was opened in November 2021 in Kyiv, with a total area of 300,000 sq m. The owner of the shopping mall is Trafin Consulting und Entwicklungs GmbH, an Austrian company founded in Vienna in 2013 and operating in the real estate sector. Currently, the shareholder of Respublika Park is strongly represented in the real estate markets of Central and Eastern Europe. Trafin invests heavily in retail, hotel and residential complexes in many countries and is a significant participant in the investment sector of the Ukrainian economy as a shareholder in the Respublika Park shopping mall.