Leisure, enjoyable parks eye growth

Leisure and enjoyable parks, which have been among the many worst-impacted companies as a consequence of Covid-19, have began drawing up growth plans as income and footfall have reached the pre-pandemic stage.

Australian Family Entertainment operator Timezone plans to open 10 new centres this yr simply because it used to do earlier than the pandemic, and plans so as to add one other 15 subsequent yr.

Different firms have related plans. “We’ve got added a go-karting observe just lately and plenty of native operators are approaching us so as to add journey sports activities at our park. Publish-Covid, it has turn out to be all about expertise and the operators wish to money in on that,” mentioned Atul Mittal, chief monetary officer at Entertainment City Ltd, which operates The Great India Place, Gardens Galleria Mall, Worlds of Marvel amusement park and Kidzania in Noida.

In response to retail specialists, many native operators have additionally sensed the chance and are opening gaming zones or journey sports activities services at standalone centres.

“Gaming centres play an enormous function in attracting households to a purchasing centre however they suffered so much through the pandemic. Most of them at the moment are reporting development and improve in income, serving to them to plan for growth,” mentioned Shriram PM Monga, principal guide at SRED, a retail consultancy agency.

Timezone, which added solely six centres in 2021, has aggressive plans for growth.

“We’ve got launched new video games and from April onwards, we achieved the pre-pandemic numbers. Our focus was extra on sanitisation initially and now that buyers belief us, we’re again to our growth plan,” mentioned Abbas Jabalpurwala, CEO, Timezone Entertainment.

In response to CBRE, leisure and enjoyable zones have began present process design modifications, providing unique slots.

Consultants mentioned the shops of tomorrow will must be much less transactional, extra inclusive and dedicated to creating one thing distinctive for buyers.

“Malls helped leisure zones through the pandemic by providing rental rebates. For greater than a yr, there have been no common operations as a result of frequent lockdowns. However after Omicron in January 2022, issues began coming again to regular,” mentioned Funky Island director Jatin Mohan.

Funky Island used to function 4 centres earlier than Covid-19 and could not add anymore. It now plans so as to add 4 centres by March 2023 and in addition develop to tier-2 cities.

Microgravity, which introduced digital reality-augmented actuality expertise to India after Covid-19, has additionally witnessed an increase in income and footfall.