Who still shops in the city center? Charm offensive must close Amsterdammer back
If you walk from Leidseplein into Leidsestraat, you will successively come across Albert Heijn to go, New York Pizza, Ice Bakery, La Place, Wok to Walk, Febo, Candy Station and La Creperie. Right across the street is Starbucks, McDonald’s, Full Moon Garden, Snoop, Crystal Steakhouse, Maoz, Chipsy King and the Croissanterie.
One clothing store is hidden among the food violence: Amsterdam Originals.
Owner Denise Kos is concerned, she says. She used to have a lingerie store, but because of all the food around her, she is used to focus her shop more on tourists and day trippers. With all her might for them to continue to develop, for example by having her clothes designed by students from the Gerrit Rietveld Academy.
Rather online than in the center
Fighting a losing battle. From the latest edition of the two-year study De Staat van de Stad into the ups and downs of Amsterdam, just as in previous discoveries, that Amsterdammers go to the city center less. The researchers calculated that the share of Amsterdammers who last received a fashion item in the city center has fallen from 30 to 22 percent in one year. People prefer to shop online rather than drag themselves downtown.
Last week the municipal office of Research, Information and Statistics held a lunch session under the title: ‘Who still shops in Amsterdam?’ There, economist Gijs Foeken explained that in shops for non-daily groceries, such as fashion stores, the loss of clientele due to corona has long since been made up for in shopping centers outside the center, the center is still very much behind.
“The orientation of Amsterdammers on their own part has been carried out,” he said on the basis of the latest figures, which the municipality collected in collaboration with MasterCard. “The orientation towards the Centrum district has decreased.”
Empty, despite the sale
According to his colleague Tanja Fedorova, the shopping centers in the center of the city are already ‘shopping a lot’. Even more is being spent in the catering industry than in 2019.
Denise Kos shows the Leidsestraat. On the corner of Kerkstraat, clothing store Ted Baker likes to stand boldly. Opposite is the luxury seafood shop Seafood Shop has been restored by the Candy Pirates. Inside, tourists are scooping sweets. In Ted Baker it is empty, despite the sale.
Kos is a board member of Biz Leidsestraat/Koningsplein, of which all shopkeepers are (mandatory) members. On Monday, the association will start a charm offensive to close the Amsterdammer back to what once passed for a luxury shopping street with icons such as Metz & Co, Dikker & Thijs and bookshop Scheltema.
For a week, “compliment girls” and “flower geishas” will be roaming the streets and offering special discounts. In the week before the summer holidays, some extra turnover is calculated. Event name: Forget me not.
Kos is, she says, ‘a positive person’. “We offer the people of Amsterdam a warm welcome and show that the problem is getting bigger than it is. We should not all keep saying that it is too busy here or that you are no longer addressed in Dutch in shops. Perhaps we need to make further improvements and give Amsterdam residents a permanent discount. In New York they do the same with their residents.”
Shortening
Yet. “We don’t want to become a second Damstraat,” says Kos, named after the street that nowadays mainly smells of shortening and where a little Amsterdammer doesn’t want to be found dead. “We’re in the danger zone,” she says.
A very realistic fear, says director Huib Lubbers of retail consultancy firm RMC. “Leidsestraat relies on recreational shopping, fashion and luxury stores. According to our research, the ratio between catering and shops in a shopping street is one in five. That is hard to find in that place. Then you can try to spend a week on the Amsterdammer, but if you really want to solve something, you will have to do it in a more structured way.”