EMIRA Property Fund has relaunched its Springfield Retail Centre in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, a year after the centre was damaged by arson in the widespread looting and devastation of July 2021.
On 12 July 2021, looters made their way into the centre and ransacked most of the stores. The mayhem culminated in an arson attack the next day, with fires starting at Mambo’s Plastics Warehouse and burning along a line of shops, including the centre’s electrical room.
The rebuilding, restoring and refreshing of the 17,300sqm community-focused lifestyle centre began immediately, with the community coming out to help. Most of the centre was reinstated and trading within a few weeks of the damage occurring. The maximum amount of SASRIA cover was in place to adequately cover any damages and loss of trading.
As part of reinstating the centre, the opportunity was taken to refresh and refine the tenant mix and reconfigure space to improve the overall shopping experience.
“We considered general shopping trends, monitored consumer patterns in Springfield Retail Centre’s catchment area and observed the centre’s tenant performance in order to identify improvements for its offering and match them with the type of retailers that would work best for the refreshed centre and its shoppers,” explains Ulana van Biljon, Emira COO.
An underutilised part of the property was reconfigured to create floor space for Coricraft’s new home and decor showroom which opened in April this year. Ted’s Home Store also took the opportunity to upgrade its 1,000sqm-plus store at Springfield Retail Centre to create an all-new showroom, which opened in May 2022. The combined impact has created one of the strongest home and décor retail offerings in the region.
Most of the restoration work has been completed and Springfield Retail Centre is already trading fully with only Westpack still to open at the end of August 2022. The open-air shopping experience has a refreshed array of tenants, from fashion and home furnishings to babies, tech and more.
