Paying the price of convenience

The emergence of shopping malls in key urban centres and neighbourhoods in recent times seems to be redefining shopping experience in Nigeria. But this is fast becoming a mixed bag for shoppers and retail shop operators, SIMON EJEMBI reports

Many years ago, shopping amounted to a stressful exercise for Ebere Agina.

“You have to be prepared to be pushed or shoved, when you go to the market. And if you are unlucky your money could get stolen,” she recalls.

She still has that experience, but only once in a while; when she goes to the market for some specific items or variety.

Most times, she patronises one of the shopping malls that have been built in different parts of Lagos over the last few years.

Apart from being a ‘way more’ convenient place to shop, the malls offer her quality products.

“Surprisingly, the prices of items in the shopping malls are sometimes cheaper than those of similar items in the (traditional) markets. Maybe it is because some of the shops in the malls get their goods straight from the manufacturers,” Agina, who patronises Shoprite in Surulere and Mr. Price, adds.

In the last five to seven years, the number of shopping malls in Lagos – and the country as a whole – has been on the rise. In Lagos, for instance, from Lekki to Victoria Island, Ikeja to Surulere, residents now have alternatives to the traditional markets.

It is a development that many shoppers commend, for making the shopping experience more convenient and organised.

For Prince Lee, a lawyer, the attraction is original items.

“I get original stuff from Shoprite, just like when I travel abroad. But it has also affected my finance; ordinarily if I spent N40, 000 a month before, I now spend about N80, 000 because I shop randomly. That could be considered a negative aspect of it,” he says.

Another shopper, Mrs. Yinka Oyeleyin, says while she appreciates the convenience the shopping malls offer, she visits them only for specific items. She, however, avoids the malls on Saturdays because they can be as crowded as traditional markets on such days. Oyeleyin says it will take up to 50 more shopping malls to ease the congestion the malls presently witness at the weekend.

But as more people throng the malls, it is not all positive.

“There is no difference between the shopping malls and Idumota (market),” Femi Jones says, while describing his experience.

He adds, “In both places where you buy goods you are harassed for money from the moment you park your car. There is no difference for me.”

The Managing Director, Lagos State Chambers of Commerce and Industry, says while the malls have raised the bar in terms of retailing, there is a flip side –they are stifling smaller retail outlets.

“They have raised the bar for supermarket chains in Nigeria; people have a standard that they can look up to,” he says.

“The flip side is that many of our local retail shops will be adversely affected. So we are likely to see significant loss of jobs in the retail sector, particularly around each of these shopping malls.”

Yusuf adds that from reports reaching him, some shops around the malls are already going out of business.

While he says the positives of the shopping malls outweigh the negatives, he stresses that the negatives still give cause for concern.

“The retail sales sector is a major employer of labour in Nigeria, so if you have a situation where the presence of this shopping mall is now affecting them, especially at a time when we are talking about unemployment and so on, it is something that should give concern,” he explains.

Emeka Chimeze, who runs a boutique in Ketu, says the emergence of the malls has not affected his business because there is no mall nearby. But the case is not the same for his brother who owns a boutique in Ogba, close to a new shopping mall.

“He has been crying that the mall is killing his business,” he said. When asked about the chances his brother may have of moving his business into the mall, Chimeze said it would cost nothing less than N5m to rent a shop in the mall.

But Lee says the emergence of the shopping malls will affect smaller shops mainly because they do not sell original goods, which, according to him, is what people want.

A pharmacist, Mr. Finbarr T, who works in a pharmacy at the Ikeja Shopping Mall, says that while the shopping malls are better organised and attract many customers, his shop does not have a big edge over others in traditional set ups.

“I think what matters is the location,” he said. “For instance there is a pharmacy near Allen Roundabout in Ikeja, and because there are a lot of companies there, it gets a lot of customers.

Mrs. Seun Awolola, who admits that the malls were likely to affect smaller business, particularly those close to the malls, says the impact will increase over time.

She adds that as soon as the shopping centres start selling everything that can be purchased in the traditional market at a similar price, she and many others like herself will have no reason to go to the traditional markets any more.

She adds, “When this happens, there will be nothing anyone can do about it”.

But Muda believes some form of regulation might help now.

“We can check their spread. There has to be a way of regulating them. So that in a city they don’t capture all the retail markets – because we have to keep our people employed,” he insists.

However, the trend being witnessed in the country at the moment is only just beginning, according to a report on retail investment – released last year.

The report, “Redefining Retail Investment”, which was published by Jones Lang Lasalle, a multinational financial and professional services company specialising in real estate, shows that the emergence of these shopping centres is likely to redefine retail investment, a development that will not only pose greater threat to small retail outlets but will see shopping centres dot the landscape.

In the report, Nigeria, alongside Venezuela, Bangladesh, Algeria, Pakistan, Iraq and Manyar, is ranked in the frontier markets, which is rated ‘opaque’ in the transparency index for 2012,, while South Africa is ranked, alongside Italy, Spain, and the UAE, in the transitional market – which is rated ‘transparent’ on the index.

In the frontier market, to which Nigeria belongs, the report says, “organised retailing is at an early stage of evolution and the retail infrastructure is still poorly developed. The number of modern shopping centres is very limited.

“Substantial market opportunities come in tandem with the major challenges that are associated with difficult operating environments, low real estate transparency and high political/economic risk.”

According to the report, the emergence of these malls is partly driven by the inexorable growth of the urban middle classes.

With regards to the future of shopping centres and retail investment in Sub-Saharan Africa, the report predicts that South African investors or developers in partnership with retailers are likely to accelerate their move across the continent.

As this happens, it adds, “The focus will be on Nigeria, the region’s largest consumer market, oil-rich Angola, Ghana and Mozambique, and some of the more stable markets in Southern and Eastern Africa.”