Saturating the East Rand's formal shopping centres

This interesting fact and many others was brought to light by research conducted by Freshly Ground Insights on behalf of the Newspaper Advertising Bureau (NAB) in November last year.

"The aim was to determine the newspaper preference and spending habits of the Etwatwa/Daveyton community," says John Bowles, Joint Managing Director of NAB. "Interesting facts about their consumption behaviour and awareness, preference and patronage of shopping centres was brought to light," he adds.

While only 48% of the respondents are employed full-time, various east rand shopping complexes still see prolific support from this demographic. Primarily aged between 25 and 34, only 1% earns between R6 000 and R9 999 per month. The majority (59%) earn between R1000 and R2999 and 11% earn less than R1000 a month. "Although none of those questioned earn more that R9999 a month, there is a massive amount of retail activity across the non-, semi- and durable outlets within the immediate area," says John.

Favourite shopping centre

When asked to tell us, unprompted, which shopping centre is visited most often in the last three months, 50% mentioned a centre within a 15km radius of Daveton and about 40% mentioned a large mall on the East Rand. Favourite among the local centres was Daveton Mall (16%) followed by Lakeside Mall (13%), Benoni Mall (10%), Atlas Mall (4%) and Carnival Mall (3%). Favourite among the large Malls on the East Rand was East Rand Mall (14%), Golden Walk (10%) and Festival Mall, Eastgate and Alberton City (5%). "These centres are 'top of mind' and as such represent the core shopping district for this market," adds John.

Looking at the bigger picture in a three-month period, on prompting, most of the commuter market (more than 85%) claim to shop at Atlas Mall, in the Benoni CBD, Daveton Mall (Local centres), Alberton City, Cresta and Eastgate (large centres). Three-quarters claim to shop at Lakeside, Northmead Square (local) and Rosebank, while half claim to shop at Rynfield Terrace, Checkers Hyper (local) and Sandton. "Although 78% of respondents travel to their favourite mall by taxi, 12% have their own car," says John and points out that "Shoprite is the preferred grocery shopping store (28%), followed by Pick n Pay (22%), Spar (18%), Checkers (9%), Score (6%) and Makro and Woolworths (both 3%)."

Favourite store by product line

Game is the preferred provider for this market when they are looking for electrical appliances, with 25% supporting the store. Lewis (15%) was the second choice and OK (12%) was third. "When looking for furniture, OK (24%) topped the ranks, followed by Lewis (14%) and Bradlows (8%). OK was also ranked at 36% for the purchase of audio visual equipment, followed by Game (27%) and Furniture City (3%)," says John. A massive 48% of this demographic do not visit DIY stores at all. Of those that do, the favourites are Cash Build (19%), CTM (13%), Mica (10%) and OK (3%).

"This research certainly indicates that although the area does not have the development that we see in an area like Soweto, there certainly are the same signs of an economically active community with the same demands for retail spending. There is no doubt that it's a matter of time before we see similar retail development growth in this area similar to that of Soweto," says John.

To find out more about this research contact John Bowles at .