Mike Ashley may make a bid to buy the Meadowhall Shopping Centre in Sheffield. This would be his biggest wager on retail real estate so far.
Frasers Group is the FTSE 100 retailer group owned by Ashley. It’s “one of a few parties” that have expressed an interest in Meadowhall.
Meadowhall, owned by British Land and Norges Bank last year, was listed for sale at a reported price of £750million. British Land and Frasers both declined to comment.
Shopping centre with 290 shops and a floor area of 1.4 million sq. ft. is fifth largest shopping mall in Britain. It receives 24 million visitors each year.
Mike Ashley is the owner of Frasers Group. Meadowhall is not Frasers first venture into retail property.
Meadowhall is not Frasers’s first venture into retail property. The company became more active in this sector last year, purchasing The Mall in Luton for £58million and the Overgate Centre for £30million from Capital & Regional. It also purchased Junction 32, a shopping outlet near Castleford in West Yorkshire for £50million.
Frasers – in which Ashley owns about 70% – said that these acquisitions were a reflection of its “confidence” in the UK’s high street.
Meadowhall is home to H&M as well as JD Sports and Next. Marks & Spencer also has a shop there. Sports Direct and Jack Wills, both owned by Frasers, have stores in Meadowhall. This spree of buying has led to questions about whether Frasers buys shopping centres in order to fill them with shops from its portfolio.
Meadowhall was built on the former site of an old steelworks in 1990 and opened. The sale would be one of the largest shopping centres transactions in recent years.
British Land has repeatedly stated that shopping centers are not a core part of their portfolio. It is more likely that British Land will reinvest the proceeds of the Meadowhall sale into retail parks. Simon Carter, chief executive of the landlord, has made this a priority.
Carter, 48 years old, joined British Land in 2020. He immediately began to expand the group’s presence within retail parks. These are very popular among tenants due to their low rents and the fact that they can be used for click-and-collect. British Land likes the locations of retail parks, which are often located on busy roads near towns. This allows them to be easily repurposed as warehouses or logistics space.