Retail rings of influence: Rethinking retail catchment analysis in the light of purchasing power

Chung Yim Yiu, Quan Le Truong, Jiaying Kou and Ka Shing Cheung

Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 2024, vol. 76, issue C

Abstract: Catchment areas are vital indicators of purchasing power that significantly influence the retail sales of shopping malls. However, conventional models, typically provided by mall owners, often assume a fixed isochrone, neglecting the sensitivity of the catchment size on mall's positioning strategies and sizes. This study introduces a novel, flexible approach, leveraging the population and household incomes of administrative units as a proxy for purchasing power, thereby enabling a sensitivity analysis on adjustable catchment sizes. We develop a Python programme to geofence these units based on an adjustable isochrone radius. This pioneering research also applies principles from the species-energy relationship and niche specialisation theory to build a theoretical model of catchment areas, empirically testing it using Australian data. Our findings confirm that while purchasing power within varying catchment sizes exerts a positive influence on retail sales, the impact is less pronounced for larger malls due to their more generalised niche in attracting customers far away from the malls. This study sheds new light on the dynamic interplay between catchment area characteristics and mall performance, offering valuable insights for future research and retail strategy planning.

Keywords: Shopping centres; Catchment area; Species-energy relationship; Niche specialisation; Isochrone (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0969698923003429
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:joreco:v:76:y:2024:i:c:s0969698923003429

DOI: 10.1016/j.jretconser.2023.103591

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services is currently edited by Harry Timmermans

More articles in Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().