Shop local: Customers call for better pedestrian access and a mix of boutique stores
Some of Melbourne’s most well-known inner-city shopping strips are experiencing a decline in shopper numbers. So we asked traders and shoppers what strips in places like Camberwell, Kew and Hawthorn need to flourish.
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Visitor numbers are down in some of Boroondara’s biggest on-street retail strips, with small businesses struggling to compete with online stores and large shopping centres.
Camberwell, Kew and Glenferrie Rd, Hawthorn, traders’ associations said visitor numbers were down overall, despite their best efforts to attract customers.
Shoppers are calling for more boutique shops, improved pedestrian access, more parking and better public spaces for people to gather.
Aaron Brooke said wider footpaths, dedicated bike lanes and safer tram stops where pedestrians were separated from traffic would encourage people to shop locally.
Sophie Paterson said “unique” shops were needed to draw people to the area.
“I want unique shops, not repetitive chain after chain,” she said.
Glenferrie Traders Association spokesman Steven Williams said having a mix of retail options was important for any strip to thrive but commercial rents were too expensive for many small operators to afford.
“Landlords have been slow off the mark in bringing down their rents,” he said.
“They’ve just started to reduce some of the rents in Hawthorn and those shops have been snapped up.”
Kerry Daly, of the Camberwell Centre Association, said the rise of online stores meant some brands had cut back on their bricks and mortar shops, resulting in vacancies in strips.
Cafes, hairdressers and other service businesses were moving in to fill some of the spaces, she said, but called on the council to invest in making the strips more attractive places to visit so they could compete with the “glamorous” big shopping centres.
“Our retailers have needed to upgrade the look of their stores, though we are hampered by the look of our streets,” she said.
Boroondara Council has previously noted it runs marketing campaigns to promote local businesses.
Spokesman Charles Turner said the council had spent more than $5.7 million improving retail precincts in Camberwell, Ashburton, Hawthorn, Kew and Burwood since 2009.
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Con Barbayannis, president of the Kew Junction Business Association, said the convenience of online shopping was difficult to compete with, but shopping locally meant retailers could offer customers a more personalised service.
“We can create long term relationships with our local customers that you will never get by shopping online or visiting a shopping centre,” he said.