March 30, 2020

The department store group Galeria Kaufhof and Karstadt is in trouble.

Requests for funding are being submitted to the German Reconstruction Loan Corporation. Allegedly in the amount of 2 billion euros.

“Let’s create and open a virtual Madrid, Paris, Budapest, Vienna, Munich, Milan or Venice for our avatars, virus-free, with the recovered turquoise lagoon, a crowded Piazza San Marco, hundreds of flying doves, etc.”

Standort + Markt published a second estimate, which focuses on stationary retail‘s anticipated, daily, average loss of revenue at all Austrian shopping places. The results provide solid guidelines for the European retail real estate market in general.

Many fashion retailers suspend their lease payments because their stores are shut down due to the corona crisis. Even H&M Germany is not paying rent for its 460 stores anymore.

What we are experiencing these days is unprecedented. Unprecedented in terms of the changes that will come. Unprecedented in regard to the question “how do we go on from here”, and also unprecedented when it comes to the constant as well as instant switches between optimism and sheer pessimism.