What makes a happy tenant?

Our guests – partners and friends of Eurobuild awards – have been helping to work out the methodology needed to select the best shopping centres in Poland. After all, this is a pilot programme. Taking a critical look at the preliminary questionnaire for tenants, together we are working to make the assessment criteria reliable and fair

This is already the third of the meetings planned with specialists from different sectors of the real estate sector. This time they have been invited to discuss the questionnaire for tenants of retail space. On the basis that is decided upon, Millward Brown will work out for us which shopping centre will receive the Tenants’ Award at this year’s Eurobuild Awards.

Working at the grass roots

These meetings are not merely an opportunity to introduce representatives of the sector to the rules of granting awards. Consultations with experts in a given field are a natural stage in the preparation process for any research. Analysts call this \'exploration\'. Assessing tenant satisfaction is not standard market research. We are the first ones in this field, and so we have no previous examples to go by. This is why we have to devote so much time to the preliminary stages.

The preliminary version of the questionnaire for shopping centre tenants has been prepared by Magdalena Tulaja, who is supervising this from the research point of view, and by Richard Stephens, who is responsible for the organizational side of the Eurobuild Awards. However, the guests invited by us have thoroughly remodelled this version so that it more accurately assesses the level of tenant satisfaction.

Key questions

The invited guests had received the preliminary questionnaire earlier, which helped them prepare thoroughly for the discussion. The first doubts came up at the very beginning. One of them concerned the person who is to fill in the questionnaire (this problem was already raised during earlier discussions on the warehouse and office sectors). The second doubt was over the number and type of tenants of a given retail facility who are to express their opinions by filling in the questionnaire. Only after solving these two issues, could we then move our focus to each particular question. “Who will answer the questions in the questionnaire form? Only the biggest chains or also smaller, local tenants?” asked Agnieszka Tomczak-Tuzińska from Caelum Development. Monika Janczewska-Leja of Globe Trade Centre suggested that we should discuss the position of the individual filling in the questionnaire. “The shop manager will be the best informed about certain issues, and for others it will be the person responsible for the finances. So I think it should be the person responsible for the development of the chain – the development manager or somebody who makes decisions about the opening of new outlets,” she suggested. This proposal closed the deliberations on dividing the questions into two questionnaires, each designed for one of these two positions in companies.

The invited guests then raised the question of the number of tenants who will be included in the research. Millward Brown’s proposal suggested a minimum of 15 pct of the tenants in each project, but no fewer than seven. The panel considered this number to be insufficient. “This makes it considerably more difficult. However, if the questionnaire is to give a meaningful result, we should collect answers from app. 50 pct of the current tenants,” suggested Roman Skowroński from Jones Lang LaSalle. Kinga Sisterman of DTZ pointed out the problem of the diversity of shopping centre tenants: “They represent various businesses, they lease retail space ranging from several thousand to several dozen thousand square metres, their needs are dissimilar, and so their assessment of the same facility might be drastically different. I do not think that the voice of a small, local tenant would be objective and should not carry the same weight as the opinion of a big chain,” she argued. Michał Masztakowski of CB Richard Ellis had a different opinion: “Such a diversity of opinions is actually a plus! Thanks to this we will have a more comprehensive picture of a given facility,” he pointed out. Magdalena Tulaja then suggested that when selecting the tenants for the satisfaction survey, Millward Brown should pay particular attention to the fact that they should represent as many various businesses present in the facility as possible.

A quick shift

There were not many issues raised with regard to the suggested 20 questions. The point of the meeting was the maximum simplification of the questionnaire and choosing the most appropriate questions. Most of these did not stir up any emotions because they were obvious. For some it was unanimously agreed that they should be omitted. These included those considered unimportant for tenants and those the person responsible for chain development would not have a clue how to answer because they refer to the scope of work of lower-status employees. Some questions and terms have been phrased more precisely as a result of the discussions, so that a tenant will know exactly what the question refers to and has no problems giving a concrete answer. In order to shorten the questionnaire, it was decided that a few questions should be joined together and that the tenant should have the possibility to freely comment on each of them. “If you consider each question separately, you will be able to calculate satisfaction rankings with regard to each particular criterion. This is important and interesting knowledge for us, for developers, and for you – the people who carry out the survey – it is a great opportunity to gather this data,” suggested Sean Briggs from AIG/Lincoln.

Representatives of Echo Investment could not participate in the meeting; however, they did give us their opinion of the questionnaire. “I believe that you should think through the method of tenants’ vote calculation and the key for the selection of the shopping centres that will be included in the survey. I think that there should be a question added referring to tenant satisfaction with the marketing of the facility, as generally understood: the promotion, activities  connected with corporate responsibility, sustainable growth, etc. However, first of all it would be worthwhile finding out which of these factors are really important for tenants,” commented Wojciech Gepner of Echo Investment. The result of this meeting was the questionnaire on the next page. As the tenants’ survey will be launched in just a few weeks, we are still open to your suggestions and comments. Please send them to:  Richard@eurobuildcee.com. They will be an important source of knowledge for us in terms of the methodology adopted and any imperfections which we and our guests have perhaps overlooked. ν (EG)

The Questionnaire

When answering, please use the following scale  (except questions marked *)

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Location

1) How satisfied are you with the accessibility by car?

2) How satisfied are you with the accessibility by public transport?

3)  How satisfied are you with the parking (enough spaces,  accessibility to parking area)?

technical

1)  How satisfied are you with the technical aspects of the centre (such as the quality of the fit-outs, plugging-in points, heating system, air-conditioning, availability of wireless connections)? If you are not satisfied, why are you not satisfied?

2)  How satisfied are you with the exterior architecture and façade design of the shopping centre?

3)  How satisfied are you with the interior design, including the friendliness of public areas such as fountains, benches, meeting areas?

4)  How satisfied are you with the layout/floorplan of the centre, in terms of ease for customers of finding what they want? If you are not satisfied, why are you not satisfied? How can it be improved?

5)  How satisfied are you with the signage of information in your shopping centre?

financial

1)  How satisfied are you with the rental level in relation to the size, type and location of the space leased in the centre?

2)  How satisfied are you with the clarity and fairness of the method of calculating the service charge? If you are not satisfied, why are you not satisfied? How can it be improved?

3)  How satisfied are you with the quality of the services provided by the service charge? If you are not satisfied, why are you not satisfied? How can it be improved?

4) How satisfied are you with the revenue of your outlet?

management

1)  How satisfied are you with the centre’s management (in terms of friendliness, availability, responsiveness, understanding needs, presence on site)? If you are not satisfied, why are you not satisfied? How can it be improved?

2)  How satisfied are you with the maintenance?

3)  How satisfied are you with the centre’s marketing strategy and promotional campaigns? If you are not satisfied, why are you not satisfied? How can it be improved?

general

1)  How satisfied are you with the tenant mix and range of shops? If you are not satisfied, why are you not satisfied? How can it be improved?

2) How satisfied are you with the anchor tenants?

3)  How satisfied are you with the number of people who visit the centre?

4)  How satisfied are you with the catering offer (quantity and selection of restaurants, cafés)? If you are not satisfied, why are you not satisfied? How can it be improved?

5)  How strongly do the expressions listed below describe your shopping centre?*

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6)  Does the space you lease in your shopping centre match your current needs?*

Yes

What are you lacking?

7)  If you were looking for retail space now, would you lease space in this shopping centre again?*

Yes

Why not?

8)  Please add any further comments which you think could provide useful feedback for the owner/developer of the shopping centre.*

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