The Novaston Platform continues to develop the retail park concept – the first retail park in Pirot to be opened soon
In September, Pirot will get the first retail park – the PULS Shopping Park – and thus join the group of cities in Serbia that provide shoppers with a special shopping experience in open-air shopping malls. This is one of the very few shopping malls that is being developed by a domestic company – AB MARKET PIROT, which was formed by PD Agomarket from Kragujevac and PD Borjana from Pirot. The Novaston Platform, which comprises Novaston Asset Management, Novaston Project Management and Novaston Marketing Consultancy, participates in the entire process from project design to realization and promotion. The GIA Company from Belgrade is the main contractor while the facility was designed by North Engineering, based in Subotica.
“The PULSE SHOPPING PARK Pirot will have a shopping area spanning close to 8,000 square meters and more than 100 parking spaces. There will be plenty of domestic and international brands on offer here while one of the biggest supermarket chains, Lidl, is near the retail park. Our leasing team worked hard on renting the premises and as a result, we have managed to bring well-known national and international brands to Pirot. After the official opening, we be in charge of keeping track of the operations of the retail park’s tenants, meeting their needs and coordinating activities with them daily, which will certainly be a challenge for all of us, given that each city, in this case, Pirot, is different,” said Olga Vlahović, leasing manager at Novaston.
“The Novaston Platform is already widely recognized as a leader in the development and management of shopping centres and retail parks”
“Our entire technical team was in charge of project management from the very beginning and development, starting with finding a conceptual solution, proposing technical solutions, defining implementation models, and the demarcation of the shell&core scope and fit-out work phases, to defining the implementation schedule, communicating with relevant institutions, providing professional supervision and obtaining a use permit. At the same time, we have been coordinating activities with the tenants, which included the formation of an initial base for contracting and drafting projects, coordination between tenants and the team in charge of designing and building the facility and organizing the handover of the premises “, explains Jelena Jolović, project manager at Novaston.
The new open-air shopping centre in Pirot shows yet again that the retail sector has shown great flexibility and resilience despite being one of the first economic sectors to be affected by the pandemic. In our country, these open-air shopping centres have been adhering to the epidemiological measures most of the time, unlike the indoor shopping malls which had to close their doors or implement greater restrictions for shoppers. The main characteristics of business flexibility during the pandemic were quick responses to the requirements of tenants as the main partners in the operations of the investment real estate sector and meeting specific goals for maintaining long-term business operations.
“Our platform is already widely recognized as a leader in the development and management of shopping centres and retail parks. We are currently in the middle of developing yet another retail park in the vicinity of Belgrade called the Ava Shopping Park, located next to Ikea. The process of concluding long-term lease agreements is nearly done and construction works have begun. We expect the Ava Shopping Park to open next year. As expected, this shopping destination will be very popular, while the retail concepts of Ikea Store and Shopping Park will benefit from their business synergy,” says the CEO of the Novaston Platform, Mia Zečević.