Anyone would think that the retail world is about to collapse with the amount of retailers that have either gone into receivership or restructured their businesses in the past 12 months here in Australia.

In fact, the number of retailer collapses is part of a global trend that has been coming for some time. Domestic brands have been spooked by the influx of global brands, with these also taking a huge share of the available retail dollar in those markets. When you add the quantum of dollars being spent online to the equation, is it any wonder that retailers that have not adapted to 2020 retailing are in trouble?

Here in Australia, the arrival of some of the world’s biggest retail brands, and the immediate dominance they have had in our market, has seen the demise of some traditional and also household retail brands throughout Australia and New Zealand.

But all is not lost. If you analyse those mid-market and mid-tier brands that have suffered at the fate of lack of market share, the biggest influence on their demise has been their resistance to change and to meeting demands of consumers and customers.

There is however an emerging group of new domestic retailers that are beating the trends on lack of growth, emerging through neighbourhood shopping centres, delivering a unique product and meeting customers’ needs.

This new breed of retailers is the next wave of retail entrepreneurs in our market who, through their ingenuity and persistence, are beating the current trends and emerging as Australia’s next group of retail brands.

In the case of Jack Zervos and his Dr Boom Communications concept, Melbourne-based Colliers Director of Retail Leasing, Michael Crittenden, recognised soon after meeting with Jack that this retailer was in touch with his customers who were voting with their feet to his concept. The Dr Boom team had recognised several elements that were missing in the mobile phone market, so decided to add Jack’s expertise to an already flooded market, with a winning result. Dr Boom will open its 10th store in two months’ time.

Likewise, Shine-On car wash group started its businesses off the back of the love of motor vehicles. This was a group of car detailers who knew what it meant to present cars in an immaculate condition so that customers would buy the vehicles. They adopt the same philosophy to their car wash business and the group today has 10 outlets in the Sydney metro area, and continues to grow. Again, this is all because they wanted to deliver a quality product at an affordable price in the growth corridors of the Sydney region.

The one thing that resonates through all these new retailer start-ups is passion, service and the retailers’ love of what they do – hardly something that can be achieved by shopping online or in multiple-brand fashion outlets across the country.

Smart retailers today not only track customer trends in the way that they shop but also in what they are spending it on. Spending vast amounts on marketing to promote Valentine’s Day only works if you can analyse after the promotion how the customer reacted to the offer or the promotion. Lessons learnt from that steers you in the right direction for the next marketing round on Mothers Day.

Technology has to be part of every retailer’s manifest in today’s world, not only to gauge spending appetites, like and dislike through colour, shape and size, but also the appeal of the offer. Just like adapting to omni channel to assist online, those retailers not adapting to the latest data technology will be next month’s headline.

The Smiggle brand is another interesting start-up. For those of us with teenage and ‘tweenage’ children, their biggest influence is electronic game technology and their flow-on trends. For Smiggle it’s about that current ‘on-trend’ theme and masking it through stationery and memento gifts complementing the latest fad. But the interaction this brand has with its customers is exceptional, such as inviting the customer to design their next take-home personal stationery or memento, or scratch and smell their pencil case, or just watch the glitter in the sun.

Smiggle, where a ‘smile meets a giggle’ is on trend and growing its customer base through clever use of try-me products and interactive online activities that appeal to them.

It’s apparent from the latest round of shopping centre developments that have recently opened here in Australia, that biggest is best, and the more ‘out there’ you make these assets the more chance you have of attracting a new customer base. In most cases that will work – the secret is keeping those customers loyal once you have attracted them to the new centre.

While most of the larger institutional landlords all try to outdo each other with their latest retail trends and new formats, the neighbourhood and sub-regional space is still the launching pad for this new wave of passionate and growth-mindset retailers.