GC “Osnova” wants to rent the space of IKEA, which left Russia, in “Mega”
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Gazprombank, which bought the Russian Mega shopping centers, is trying to find tenants for 400 thousand square meters. m, which in these facilities was occupied by IKEA, which left the country. According to Kommersant, GC Osnova, owned by Alexander Ruchev, wants to rent premises in ten of the fifteen former stores for its thermal complexes Termoland. But filling all IKEA premises with one tenant is a difficult task. Experts believe that the space could eventually be divided between different structures.
Two Kommersant sources in the real estate market told that the Termoland chain of thermal complexes, owned by the Osnova Group of Companies, is negotiating with Gazprombank, which owns the Mega shopping centers in the Russian Federation, about renting space that was previously occupied by IKEA, which left the Russian market. President and co-owner of Osnova Group of Companies Alexander Ruchev confirmed to Kommersant that the company is discussing the opening of Thermolands in ten Mega shopping centers in the regions of the country.
According to him, the first shopping center where Thermoland may open will be Mega in Kazan. Preliminary agreements on this were reached at the end of 2023, explains Mr. Ruchev. Gazprombank did not answer Kommersant.
IKEA, controlled by the Swedish Ingka Centers, had 15 stores throughout Russia with a total area of more than 400 thousand square meters. m, as indicated in the company’s reporting. The furniture retailer left the Russian market in August 2022, laying off 10 thousand employees and closing all its stores in the country. Ingka Centers also owned 14 Mega shopping centers with a total area of 2.3 million square meters until September 2023. m in Moscow, Moscow region, Leningrad region and other regions. Then the rights to these objects were transferred to Gazprombank (see “Kommersant” dated September 14, 2023).
In February 2024, the deputy chairman of the bank, Tigran Khachaturov, said that new tenants would come to replace the IKEA stores in the Mega complexes in 2024. According to him, the company has specific proposals from potential partners and this year they will decide and close this issue.
In July 2023, even before Gazprombank’s deal to purchase Mega shopping centers, there were other contenders for IKEA Square. Then the manufacturer of sleep products Askona considered the space vacated after the retailer left Russia, including in Mega shopping centers, for its hypermarkets, said Vladimir Korchagov, executive director of Askona B2C Russia and CIS. The company did not comment on whether this interest remained or not.
Now large retailers, including DIY chains and furniture stores, which were called the main contenders for IKEA space in the market, are seeing a trend towards optimizing space and opening new facilities in a more compact format.
Thus, the OBI chain reported that it does not plan to scale the chain’s traditional hypermarket format with an area of 10–15 thousand square meters. m. At the same time, it will be difficult for thermal complexes to occupy all the space that IKEA had in the Russian Federation, according to market participants interviewed by Kommersant. Therefore, they suggest, in order to reduce vacant space in Mega shopping centers, Gazprombank will have to look for a wide pool of potential anchor tenants.
Ricci Partner | BlackStone Alexey Sigal, however, considers the thermal baths an “interesting format”; such projects allow such large objects as Mega to reduce the space vacated after the departure of Western brands.
According to NF Group, at the end of 2023, 18% of thermal baths were located in shopping centers; in 2026, this figure will increase to 25%. According to CMWP estimates, 16 new thermal complexes are expected to open throughout Russia in 2024, and another 33 facilities are announced for 2025–2027.
This format is in demand and generates traffic, says Mr. Segal. However, visitors to thermal baths in shopping centers do not always visit stores after visiting such a complex, notes Alexey Vanchugov, managing partner of Vanchugov and Partners. In addition, opening a thermal bath on the site of IKEA will require significant investment.
According to estimates by Pavel Lyulin, vice-president of the Union of Trade Centers, Termoland’s expenses for launching these facilities could reach 27 billion rubles. He believes that it would be more profitable from the point of view of rental income for the owner of Mega shopping centers to cut up the space and rent it out to smaller tenants, but this requires serious investment on the part of the owner himself.
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