Gaming operators diversifying retail portfolio

The Parisian Macao, set to open on September 13, will host 170 luxury and lifestyle brands in its 320,000 square feet retail space, according to a press release. The new shopping space will increase the total number of shops in the LVS duty-free luxury Shoppes Cotai Strip Macao malls to over 850.
According to The Parisian release the new gaming resort will offer a selection of luxury brands in the territory from cosmetics to men and women’s fashion to jewellery and watches, confectionary, shoes and accessories.
The space will also include 22 luxury brands available for the first time in the territory, such as Antonia, Sonia Rykiel and Temptation, the release announces.
The retail space Shoppes at Parisian will also interconnect to the Sands Shoppes Cotai Strip Macao malls via air conditioned walkways and moving walkways, according to the release.
A report in May by global consulting firm Bain & Company predicted that the luxury market in Macau and Hong Kong will ‘continue to struggle’. The latest official data released by the Statistics and Census Services (DSEC) shows local retail sales value of watches, clocks and jewellery fell 18.3 per cent year-on-year to MOP3 billion for the first three months of the year, whilst overall sales volume plunged 12.3 per cent year-on-year.
Spend to stay
The Parisian Macau website states that 34 shops already have a fixed area in the resort, for known fashion and accessories brands such as Calvin Klein, Gucci, Swarovsky and Vivienne Westwood; while remaining shops have yet to be set up.
The new resort will also be included in the Shop & Stay promotion available in other Sands resorts where shoppers who spend more than MOP20,000 (US$2,500) will be given the opportunity to earn stars according to their level of spending until October 16.
Shoppers who spend MOP100,000 in The Parisian Macau retail area can be rewarded by a two-night stay in a Lyon Suite available for booking until December 30.
Galaxy Entertainment Group Ltd. launched a VIP shopper programme last month, rewarding big shoppers with free hotel stays and access to resort facilities, some of the perks once reserved for high-rolling gamblers.
Macau’s gaming industry needs to adjust by boosting its revenue share from recreational players in order to develop the city in a sustainable way, Paulo Chan, head of the Gaming Inspection and Co-ordination Bureau, the government regulator, recently observed.
Macau plans to increase the proportion of casinos’ non-gaming revenue to nine per cent by 2020 from 6.6 per cent in 2014, according to the city’s five-year development plan.