Eastern Europe shopping centers set to overtake Western Europe

Over the past twenty years, shopping malls space has grown across both Eastern and Western Europe. Thanks to RegioData Research’s new report, a comparison of sales area growth can now be taken between the two areas.

What is first obvious from the data is that Eastern Europe has seen a staggering amount of growth during the first part of this century. Growth also happened in Western Europe, but not nearly as rapidly or on such a large scale. 

In the last decade, while growth has remained steady but slow in Western Europe, the area still reached a level of close to 100 million square meters of shopping mall space. Eastern Europe’s quicker pace of growth was shocking, but did not allow it to catch up with its neighbour, reaching only 70 million square meters. Given that Western Europe has a population of 410 million and Eastern Europe has a population of 400 million, Western Europe still maintains a higher shopping center density per population.

It seems likely that Eastern Europe will soon close the gap. The development of shopping malls in Western Europe has been taking place over the past 60 years, while Eastern Europe’s main growth period occurred in just the last 20 years. This accelerated growth started in 1995 and has resulted in a doubling of shopping center floor space every five years.

Over the same period, Western Europe’s growth reached levels no higher than 27%. The highest level of growth in floor space in Western Europe occurred between 1990 and 1995, reaching a level of over 40%.