Once the heart of each town and city, New Zealand’s high streets have had to overcome many challenges over the years, including the advent of big malls, the rise in online shopping and in working from home, cost of living and inflation. Around the country, Herald reporters set out to find what has changed in the country’s main arteries, and how retailers are adapting.
Balclutha’s main drag, Clyde St, hums with the thoroughfare of State Highway 1.
Like many small South Island towns, cafes, retail stores, churches, grocers, and hair salons line the street, intermittently neighboured by empty buildings either for sale or for lease.
Stepping away from the State Highway, the side streets are quieter, and real estate signs are a common fixture.
At the corners of Clyde and John Sts, at the centre of the main strip, is a large white building, empty save for old desks and other discarded items. The building used to be a BNZ that closed mid-2021.
A passing pedestrian says it’s a shame such a lovely building is still empty.
Residents and workers of Balclutha largely agree that things are quieter in the South Otago town, but people remain positive.
A retail worker, who did not want to be named, said they had a single customer in the first three days of the week, and sales were slow.
Face, Body and Beauty clinic owner Annalise Mitchell said she and other retailers had had to get creative to not only retain clients but reach new ones in the current climate.
“Depending on the industry, I think a lot of [people] are quite down. You hoped things would pick up and you’d survive through the Covid lockdowns and things like that and things would get a bit better, but since that, there has definitely been a downturn.”
“It’s really stressful.”
A café worker who did not want to be named said that things had picked up during the school holidays, but were starting to quieten down again.
Powerzone Motorcycles 2IC Tim Hunt said while sales were still ticking along, things were slower now than he had seen in 20 years.
“There’s quite a lot of parks down the main street, which for Balclutha in the middle of the day’s unusual. The whole town is just a wee bit quieter. It’s just a general feeling.”
Several businesses on the main street advertised sales.
“I think people and businesses in general are probably finding it a little bit tougher, so they’re just trying to clear out all that stuff that’s been sitting and and just keep the cash flow going, you know.
“I think in general, the town feels reasonably positive, but still people are just aware that it’s time to clamp down on things.
“I think we’ll come out of it, maybe next year at some stage, and hopefully things will be back to normal.”
A tough decade for Auckland’s Queen St
The proposal to close Smith & Caughey’s early next year sums up the retail landscape on Auckland’s Queen St.
The city’s flagship department store, famous for its upmarket brands and globally acclaimed Christmas window displays, has survived two world wars and the Great Depression but is succumbing to a “perfect storm” of factors.
Chairman Tony Caughey cited a range of factors to the Herald in May - the economic downturn and a big drop in consumer confidence; the rise of shopping malls; upmarket brands building their own retail stores; Auckland CBD traffic, crime and safety issues, and a drop in pedestrians with many people still working from home.
A lack of customers was cited this month when French beauty retailer Sephora announced the closure of its flagship store on Queen St on August 19.
Two other factors have contributed to the current malaise. The move to the lower end of Queen St by the corporates and high-end retail offerings at Britomart, Commercial Bay, and luxury brands has sucked much of the life out of the mid and upper ends of the once “Golden Mile’.
The second factor is the ongoing disruption and financial toll on businesses caused by eight years of work on the City Rail Link and projects by the Auckland Council to restrict car access and dress up the city for when the CRL finally opens in 2026.
A programme of projects is under way to address the Midtown woes and prepare for the opening of the CRL, but for now, it’s a fenced-off zone of dust, dirt and noise.
Sections of Queen St have also been widened for pedestrians and cyclists, and down to one lane for buses with limited access to cars. Millions of dollars in fines have been collected.
The council’s vision? A people-friendly, vibrant, and attractive Queen St.
Heart of the City chief executive Viv Beck said right now it’s tough for businesses on Queen St following nearly a decade of construction, Covid, and access challenges but she anticipates a brighter future post-CRL.
Asked if Queen St will ever go back to its glory days, Beck said people’s shopping habits have changed but is confident there is still a place for bricks and mortar and more mixed-use developments occurring, like refitting the old McDonald’s building with about 600 studio units for student accommodation and retail at street level.
Another positive, she said, is in lower Queen St where demand for luxury brands is outstripping supply, and she anticipates this will creep further up Queen St.
A walk along Queen St this week found 29 empty stores, down from 40 stores during the same exercise in 2021. This week’s exercise also found nine empty stores in the Queens Arcade and 12 in the Strand Arcade, both off Queen St.
The CBD is only at 70% of pre-Covid traffic, and 33,000 fewer people are coming in during the morning peak.
Beck said the CBD is in a situation where it doesn’t have enough people, saying the planning has been modelled on big, dense, international cities, which Auckland isn’t.
“Amenity has been taken away before we have had good alternatives. We are supportive of these big projects and public transport but right now we need more people here and more business-friendly policies to support the next couple of years,” she said.
One thing pleasing Beck is vacancies are heading in the right direction, dropping from a peak of 14.4% in December 2021 to 10.4%, albeit still below pre-Covid levels.
Safety is another issue scaring people, with police hoping they can retain trust and confidence after new beat police officers started taking to the streets this month, managed from a central city police base in Federal St.
An extra 21 police officers have been redeployed in Auckland City, bringing the total number of beat police in the CBD to 51 to operate on a round-the-clock model, working on a rostered basis with five teams, each led by a sergeant.
Police Superintendent Scott Gemmell said as a result of increased presence of police in the CBD, which had been going on for some time now even before the establishment of the new beat police, there’s been a downward trajectory on criminal activities.
Lambton Quay’s unique challenge in Wellington
Meanwhile in Wellington, the face of the city’s premiere shopping, government, and business precinct is about to change dramatically, and some retailers may not survive it.
Lambton Quay meanders along the path of the capital’s original foreshore before a magnitude 8.2 earthquake struck in 1855 and significant land reclamation ensued.
It forms the beginning of the Golden Mile which continues through to Willis and Manners Sts and Courtenay Pl.
The 2016 closure of the Kirkaldie and Stains department store after 152 years in business was a sign of things to come for the traditionally sought-after street.
More than 40 empty shop fronts were recently counted along the Golden Mile.
David Jones replaced Kirks but also couldn’t make the flagship site work. A spokesperson cited “the accelerated shift to online” as one of the reasons for closing in 2022.
Like other high streets around the country, Lambton Quay is also experiencing the effects of more people working from home and tighter discretionary spending in a tough economic climate.
Wellington has the unique additional challenge of thousands of public servants losing their jobs as part of the Government’s quest to find cost savings.
Retailers will now be tested by Wellington City Council’s plan to remove private vehicles from the Golden Mile.
The project includes dedicated bus lanes, bike lanes and wider footpaths to prioritise walking and cycling. There will be better lighting, more public seating and outdoor dining.
First Retail Group managing director Chris Wilkinson said big retailers operating on Lambton Quay were able and prepared to withstand the disruption.
“These things are happening around the world and in some ways, they’re necessary to create environments that are going to reel people back into the city centres because we’ve got real challenges going on with our weekday audiences.”
It will be more difficult for independent retailers to withstand the disruption.
Nicola Cranfield has already decided to close her retail store Cranfields after 33 years, saying she didn’t want to spend any more time fighting the council over its plan.
She was worried about roadworks, limited access to her store when the work was completed, and the removal of carparks.
Wilkinson hoped changes to the Golden Mile would develop better pedestrian flow to parts of Lambton Quay which currently have vacancies.
“One side is typically busier than the other but by developing much better pedestrian flow the likelihood is that we can start to strengthen the other side of Lambton Quay, make it a better side of the street for shopping and ultimately win some new business as well.”
Tauranga’s plans to survive - and thrive
Tauranga’s high street is a shell of its former bustling self. But more than $1.5 billion of investment is transforming the city’s centre and leaders believe changes to its landscape will bring the city back to life.
Issues have beleaguered Tauranga’s city centre in recent years: Many of its buildings were required to undergo stringent earthquake strengthening works, toxic black mould was found in the civic administration building in 2014 and it needed to be demolished, and the new shopping centres popping up in the surrounding suburbs have lured away retail customers. Combine that with the work the council has been undertaking to beautify its streetscapes and upgrade its public spaces, and Tauranga city centre has felt like a construction zone for the better part of a decade.
These issues saw shops closing up and leases not renewed, the public complained about the lack of and the price of parking, and begging and homelessness became more visually prominent. The city’s high street soon gained the reputation of a ghost town.
But Tauranga city centre’s landscape is changing - literally.
Old buildings are being demolished. The skeletons of modern new buildings, some high-rise, are poking up above the ground. Towering cranes can be seen from miles away. Multiple large-scale developments are under way in the city centre or, in the case of the Farmers building and Elizabeth Towers apartment complex, have recently been completed. The harbourfront carpark has been ripped out and is being replaced with a sprawling greenspace and destination playground, which will eventually link through a freshly landscaped Masonic Park to the new civic precinct Te Manawataki o Te Papa that will include a new library, museum, and exhibition centre.
Tauranga Mainstreet chairman John Dewes-Hodgson, who is the owner of city centre business Tranquillo Beauty Clinic, said Tauranga’s high street was transforming from the traditional retail-and-offices model to something quite different - a hub of corporations and the smaller businesses that service their many employees.
“There’s so much new stuff going in and the older sort transitioning out,” Dewes-Hodgson said. “And, in the meantime, the chain stores have all disappeared.”
Dewes-Hodgson said the death of the traditional high street model in Tauranga began when Devonport Rd, the main shopping street, got “slaughtered” by legislatively-required earthquake-strengthening works and many businesses relocated or closed down.
And that meant those who remained or started fresh had to adapt to what Dewes-Hodgson described as a “different dynamic”.
“The future is going to be corporate, and then there’s going to be service retail. It’s not going to be a chain, it’s going to be specialist shops, something that’s unique and wants to attract the downtown people.
Tauranga City Council general manager of city development and partnerships Gareth Wallis said the traditional high street concept was a focal point where people would meet and spend time, generating a “constant buzz of activity”.
In past years, various macroeconomic factors such as Covid-19, inflation, the growth in popularity of shopping malls, the rising cost of living, and community safety resulted in a shift in people’s shopping behaviours, and high streets across the world were impacted, Wallis said.
“While there might be a shift on what’s driving people into a city, the core principles of a high street remain. A successful city needs a central hub which the community want to spend time in, and how cities pivot to find new ways of creating that central buzz is going to be key for the future.
“There is no one-size-fits-all approach to make a high street successful. It’s about finding what makes a place unique and creating more reasons for people to want to live, work and relax there.”
Wallis said Tauranga’s city centre is undergoing a “once-in-a-generation transformation”, to once again become the “thriving beating heart of Tauranga”.
Priority One is the western Bay of Plenty’s economic development agency. Chief executive Nigel Tutt said Tauranga, like many other high streets in the country and world, has had a tougher time with increased competition, a “lack of focus” from the council prior to the commission, and fewer office workers post-Covid.
Tutt said the outlook had changed dramatically with developments from the private sector, government, the University of Waikato and Tauranga City Council.
“With more people in the CBD I’m very confident that we’ll see retail return in numbers, complementing the number of great bars and restaurants that we already have.”
Chamber of Commerce chief executive Matt Cowley said city centres were always evolving.
“Ultimately, the goal for Tauranga’s city centre is to become more than a 9 to 5 work destination, which is starting to occur with a number of apartment buildings in the pipeline.
National retailer returning to Rotorua’s CBD
A national retailer is placing its faith in Rotorua by returning to the city centre after 11 years of absence.
Toyworld is coming back on August 2 next month - opening a new premises in the Rotorua Central Business District.
Along with the Lakefront redevelopment, news of work beginning to restore the Rotorua Museum and the recent re-opening of the Aquatic Centre, is a sign that Rotorua could be on its way to recovery from its recent challenges.
New owner Chris Fleming told the Rotorua Daily Post that despite the challenges Rotorua has faced over the years they believe it was good for business to bring back the brand.
“Rotorua has experienced significant challenges over the past few years, but we see the opportunity to add an iconic brand back into the heart of the city as something that is good for business, we hope to support other stores in the CBD and add to the revitalisation of Rotorua.
Fleming and his wife own Paper Plus and Toyworld in Te Awamutu and Paper Plus in the Rotorua Central Mall.
“When we purchased the Paper Plus business it was always our intention to bring Toyworld back to Rotorua.”
The business previously operated as Martin’s Toyworld on Eruera St, but the family who ran the business sold the building in 2013 following the death of owner Deryck Hintz.
Bayleys Rotorua salesman Mark Rendell told the Rotorua Daily Post at the time the building was up for sale that Rotorua had seen a marked change in shopping habits over the past decade.
Steiners Interiors by Reputation owner Mike Steiner said the changes made to the Rotorua CBD over the years reflected how people have evolved in their social habits, needs and perspectives.
He said 25 years ago the majority of people’s leisure time used to be spent shopping but that is was no longer the case.
“Now it is much more convenience shopping and the attraction of warm days, convenient locations such as malls, and destination locations.”
Steiner said it was a struggle for retail, especially those in the more selective high-end market, as Rotorua had a high percentage of a low socio-economic population and that the changes Rotorua Lakes Council had been implementing were “insufficient to retain existing business or attract new”.
Local Democracy Reporting recently reported crime had been tracking down in the CBD since its City Community Safety Hub was opened last year following public after-school attacks on teen girls near a CBD bus stop.
Rotorua area commander Inspector Herby Ngawhika updated councillors on progress at a community and district development committee meeting last month.
Trespass offences reduced the most, by 39%, and property damage was down 37%. Drug and antisocial offences were down 24% and dishonesty 14%. Violence offences dropped 26%.
Mayor Tania Tapsell told the Rotorua Daily Post the result was because of collaboration between the council, police “and others working together to improve community safety”.
“We see this as a great start towards revitalising our inner city and continuing to build confidence for our businesses, community, and our many visitors who are returning.”
Honey Comb salon owner Sarah Pearson said people were not coming into town anymore because of financial reasons and that the CBD was seen as more of a service town as everything people could need can be done on every single street of Rotorua.
“When people don’t have that spare cash, they have to cut things out. That self-care, those little luxuries that people have, they don’t spend it - even coffee, I mean, people just don’t have that when they’ve got bills to pay and children to feed.
“Most of our town is a service town in a sense, the tourists love it but you know you can now get a massage, sushi, you can get your husband’s hair cut, your hair cut and get your nails done on every single street in Rotorua. Let’s have a few different shops.”
Pearson said although Rotorua needed more businesses, she said in her opinion it was not the time to start one as most current businesses are “hanging on a limb”.
In the next 10 years, Steiner sees the Rotorua CBD as diminished with very little to offer for retail.
Steiner suggested a way to improve the CBD would be to build more residential housing in inner city dwellings.
“Inner city dwellings need to be encouraged and established. Grow our economic base and population base and strive to regain our pride and mana.”
Pearson thought that in the next 10 years, if Rotorua CBD made good use of its cultural roots, and implemented ideas such as having an open roof bus and cracked down on anti-social behaviour, Rotorua’s image could be restored.
“The Business Chamber has a major plan for some really positive changes that will shift the CBD paradigm in the right direction,” CEO of Business Chamber of Commerce Bryce Heard said.
He was not ready to share those just yet.
Hamilton’s Victoria Street not what used to be
Hamilton’s high street - Victoria St - is not what it used to be, local business leaders say.
Gone are the days of late-night shopping on a Friday, crowded shops and “Midnight Madness” during Fieldays, however, it’s definitely not all doom and gloom.
“The concept of the high street is changing... The high street is not just retail anymore,” Hamilton Central Business Association general manager Vanessa Williams said.
Hamilton City Libraries Whakaputu Special Collections librarian Perry Rice said the history of Victoria St as Hamilton’s main street goes back to the 19th century.
“Victoria St was the longest street on the original town plan... Businesses started in the 1860s close to the river,” Rice said.
After the railway came to town in the 1880s, banks, Government departments, hotels and shops appeared on Victoria St.
The street received a further boost of shops in the early 20th century after it became a part of the state highway network, and after 1939 when Garden Place was developed.
“The peak was probably in the 1970s/1980s. In the day, shops and offices were only open Monday to Friday with a late night on Friday in most towns.”
Williams remembers the late-night shopping as a teenager.
“It was much more of a retail offering that one could only get here. There was ... [also] ‘Midnight Madness’ during Fieldays.”
Now, a lot of the retail offering is available online.
“So there has to be more for people [in town],” Williams said. “It’s about the wider offering... It’s much more about the experience.”
One of the city’s long-running businesses is outdoor equipment store TreknTravel. Owner Colin Hancock opened the shop at the bottom end of Victoria Street in 1997.
He said the location was good for his business as people were coming into his shop on the way to or from the restaurants and cafes.
“And I felt like all my competitors were on the other end [of Victoria Street].”
Hancock noticed foot traffic slowing down when Chartwell Shopping Centre and Te Awa The Base opened.
“But that made Hamilton interesting and a good place to come to, because it had both - the malls and a high street.”
Despite the popularity of online shopping, he found people were coming back into the shops.
“They do their research online, but they come in to see if the item is the right colour or size, how it fits or what the material feels like.”
Hancock noticed a further decline in foot traffic in the past two years which he put down to the economy.
“But I am confident. We’ve been here before and we will get over it again.
“We just need our confidence back... And support local businesses.”
This feature is a collaboration between several NZME newsrooms across the country and was written by reporters Ben Tomsett, Bernard Orsman, Georgina Campbell, Danielle Zollickhofer, Sonya Bateson, and Fayzah Mohamed.