The influence of tenant diversity on the performance of shopping centres

Abstract

This study investigated whether a relationship exists between tenant diversity and the return on investment in South African regional and super-regional shopping centres. The Simpson diversity index was used to calculate the tenant diversity in 10 super-regional shopping centres and 50 regional centres in South Africa. The analysis was performed over one-year, three-year and five-year periods. The regression analysis showed that a positive linear relationship exists between retail categories diversity and the return on investment over a three- and five-year period in the case of regional shopping centres that are located in the Western Cape province. A weak linear relationship exists between return on investment and retail categories diversity for all super-regional shopping centres and regional shopping centres that are located in the Gauteng province.