It will be a further seven years before there is a rebalancing of the physical and online retailing sectors across Europe, Colliers International is forecasting in its latest report. “We are seeing a significant slowdown in e-commerce growth, and we believe that the market share achieved by online retailing in the UK which is about 27 percent, is not going to be repeated elsewhere in Europe,” said Etienne van Unen, Colliers’ co-head of EMEA retail. “For all European subregions, we expect 2025 to be a watershed year as e-commerce spending reaches a point of maturity across these territories.” The future demand for retail space will either come from new retailers or online giants neither of which have the 20th-century “legacy” problems of huge store networks and the crippling costs that these can entail, according to Colliers.
