South-side expansion of Square One Shopping Centre. Photo: Square One
Landlord Oxford Properties announced this week that it is launching same-day delivery from its shopping centres in an effort to gain consumer market share amid a changing world and the COVID-19 pandemic. The new ‘ShipNow’ initiative launches initially at the Square One shopping centre in Mississauga and will be rolled out to other Oxford-managed shopping centres in Canada in due course.
Oxford Properties partnered with GoFor Industries to offer ShipNow, which is descried as being a same-day delivery service that will ship goods from Square One’s retailers to almost one million customers in the shopping centre’s catchment area. The ShipNow service will be available to all of Square One’s retailers to fulfill in-store, online, and phone orders from the store to the local trade area.
Bradley Jones
“Our malls are exceptionally well-located and easily accessible to large catchment areas within a short-driving distance. This means that the reverse is also true, so goods shipped from our shopping centres can quickly and cost-effectively reach a large customer base on the same day,” said Bradley Jones, Head of Retail at Oxford Properties. “When you also consider that our malls, like Square One, have millions of square feet that currently hold merchandise and products, we already have the critical infrastructure to offer seamless same-day delivery on behalf of our retailers.
“Physical retail has become important for retailers in driving brand loyalty, customer experience, and building the top of the sales funnel. Stores have become a medium to acquire customers and we’re now providing our retailers with fulfillment strategies to transact online sales,” Jones went on to say. “Our partnership with GoFor assists us in playing a larger role in the entire customer journey and unlocking the enormous potential of shopping centre stores to play an integral part of the distribution network, particularly at a time when logistics space is in short supply.”
The ShipNow from Square One with GoFor initiative says that it enables local shoppers to access mall retailers with convenient, same-day delivery which was previously unavailable or only possible with extended delivery times. The program also allows retailers to place local inventory into the e-commerce space to get orders delivered to shoppers with same day delivery.
“Global consumer delivery patterns and shopping habits have shifted fundamentally as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic,” said Brad Rollo, CEO of GoFor. “We don’t expect to see customers’ desire for fast delivery to disappear and malls like Square One are leading the way and adapting to meet their customers where they are. We are excited to work with Oxford Properties to provide scalable, on-demand and same-day delivery to the retailers’ customers and look forward to assisting the retailers in owning their last mile fulfillment and keeping up with consumer demand.”
Brad Rollo
Plans are in place to roll out ShipNow to other Oxford-managed malls in Canada, including Yorkdale and Scarborough Town Centre in Toronto, Hillcrest Mall in Richmond Hill, Upper Canada Mall in Newmarket, Promenades Gatineau near Ottawa, Les Galleries de la Capitale in Quebec City, Southcentre Mall in Calgary, and Kingsway Mall in Edmonton.
Retail supply chain expert Gary Newbury, who is also a Senior “Exec On Call” at Toronto-based Retail AID, said, “This is another great collaboration bringing the mall as an entity temporally closer to the community, especially during the COVID times of lockdown. It facilitates retailers, who might be facing a closed mall with limited options to continue to grow their sales in some of the most toughest conditions faced in Canadian retailing.”
Newbury went on to say, “We can probably thank Amazon’s shift to next day, and for some items same day, in 2019, the pandemic’s effect to force partners to work together in different ways, and also the appetite to look at more risk sharing revenue models between retailers and landlords for such a development.”
“As landlords re-evaluate their revenue models and focus on added services, this will herald a new age of collaboration rather than combative relationships in this highly inter-dependant relationship. Malls were designed for retail and such moves are genuinely a step in the right direction,” Newbury went on to say, “Imagine Square One becomes the ‘everything mall’ locally and shoppers can shop across the mall and have one delivery. Imagine a 3PL such as GoFor being able to assemble high density routes driving the “delivery cost” to be a smaller part of basket spend, and for the consumer, they win by a consistent same day service, complete with tracking and courteous delivery drivers.”
ShipNow is the latest innovation form Oxford Properties. In September of 2019 the landlord launched Search. Find. ShopNOW, a platform which allows customers to see what products are offered by selected retailers in one online search. If a shopper was looking for a black dress, for example, Oxford Properties’ shopping centre websites showcase all products that fit the search, allowing consumers to contact to the store to check availability, visit the store itself, or purchase the item directly from the retailer’s online website.
Quebec-based Pür & Simple, a popular breakfast, brunch, and lunch restaurant, has launched its first location in Alberta at the Kingsway Mall in Edmonton with plans to continue to grow the brand across the country.
The concept is one of Canada’s fastest growing breakfast chains with its first location in September 2016 in Laval, Quebec. It introduced a franchising model in September 2017 and today has 20 locations in Canada.
The first franchise location was in Moncton, NB, which opened in March 2018.
And the company is growing despite the challenges presented by the current COVID-19 pandemic.
Ritou Maloni
“We’re one of those companies that is not going to take no for an answer. We’re going to fight through it. We’re opening stores and our franchise partners are excited to open,” said Ritou Maloni, Pür & Simple Co-Founder, President, and Chief Operating Officer.
“We’re small but we’re a growing company. We’re looking at a Canada-wide expansion.”
Growth plans include the brand’s next opening in Paradise, just outside of St. John’s in Newfoundland. From there, plans are to open in Port Coquitlam, BC, then Dartmouth Crossing, just outside of Halifax, then Waterloo in June followed by Bayers Lake, outside of Halifax, Woodbridge, Ontario, Mississauga, another one in Nova Scotia and one in Calgary.
Recently the company opened in Vaughan and North York in Ontario. The plan is to open about 12 additional locations in Canada this year.
Pür & Simple is known for its modern design and unique menu, bringing a modern twist to the classic ‘diner’ experience. With strategic partners like Nespresso, Ocean Spray, and The Martini Club, Pür & Simple has elevated daytime dining and has introduced a winning combination of luxury and affordability to its customers.
“We wanted a new take on breakfast. The trend where everybody wanted things a little bit healthier but not too healthy. I think in general when people eat in a restaurant they want to indulge a little bit and have that restaurant experience. We wanted it to be simple. We wanted that mix of traditional, authentic breakfast with a little bit extravagant ‘wow’ plates,” said Maloni.
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Example of Pür & Simple menu items. Photo: Pür & Simple
Example of Pür & Simple menu items. Photo: Pür & Simple
Example of Pür & Simple menu items. Photo: Pür & Simple
Example of Pür & Simple menu items. Photo: Pür & Simple
Example of Pür & Simple menu items. Photo: Pür & Simple
Pür & Simple offers a wide variety of breakfast, brunch, and lunch items – from homemade waffles and crêpes, to savoury Benedicts and skillets, to sandwiches and burgers. With an ever-evolving menu of health-forward offerings, Pür & Simple is constantly introducing fresh new items for customers to enjoy, while ensuring fan-favourites remain in consistent rotation. In addition to a selection of fruit-filled smoothies and specialty coffees, the Pür & Simple menu also includes an array of alcoholic beverages. Customers will find a number of menu items that cater to specific dietary needs, including gluten free, dairy free, keto, and vegan alternatives.
“If you walk into one of our restaurants the decor just in itself sets us apart. It’s crisp. It’s warm. It’s very green. We have a lot of nice greenery. It feels modern but yet inviting to anybody,” said Maloni. “We definitely have a great design.
“And our food is Instagramable to say the least. When you get a plate in front of you, most people if they don’t say ‘wow’ their tongues are out and their mouth is watering. Our portion sizes are huge and we really give that value.
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Map of Kingsway Mall with red arrow indicating location of Pür & Simple restaurant.
Exterior of Kingsway Mall in Edmonton showing H&M and Marshalls. Photo: Kingsway Mall
Exterior of Kingsway Mall in Edmonton showing Homesense. Photo: Kingsway Mall
“Our menu offerings are much more varied than a diner style breakfast. We really reinvented breakfast in the sense of what it was before in a diner. If you were going to go for breakfast it was greasy, eggs, bacon. We refined breakfast. We put a finesse to it. But yet we still target everybody. It’s an affordable luxury. I think we just made breakfast sexy.”
Edmonton franchise partner, Anjum Vadia, said he quickly became a believer in everything the company does and felt strongly that the opportunity to open his own location in Edmonton was one that he could not pass up.
“Pür & Simple differentiates itself from other brands by serving up not only delicious, healthy meals, but also by creating a warm and welcoming environment that truly makes you feel at home,” he said.
“We are thrilled to welcome Alberta’s first Pür & Simple location to Kingsway Mall and look forward to introducing the Edmonton community to this one-of-a-kind restaurant experience,” said Susan Lovie, Director and General Manager at Kingsway Mall.
Exterior of Forever 21 storefront in the US. Photo: Forever 21
Los Angeles-based fast fashion retailer Forever 21 will make its return to Canada this year with physical stores after shuttering all locations as part of a bankruptcy filing in 2019. Toronto-based YM Inc. is leading the expansion after establishing a partnership last year that included announcing a new Forever 21 e-commerce site for the Canadian market.
YM Inc. acquired many of Forever 21’s leases after the retailer exited Canada. YM subsequently opened stores under various banners in the former Forever 21 locations including Urban Planet, Urban Behaviour and Stitches. Many of the Forever 21 stores saw few changes to the retail spaces following the shuttering of the original chain, possibly in anticipation of re-introducing the Forever 21 banner to the Canadian market. Now some of the former Forever 21 locations will be converted back to the original banner as the brand again re-enters Canada.
It’s not yet clear how many Forever 21 locations that YM will open in Canada, though locations are confirmed already for Metropolis at Metrotown near Vancouver, as well as Devonshire Mall in Windsor, Ontario. The Windsor store will be located in a space most recently branded as Urban Behaviour.
Forever 21 closed all of its 44 Canadian stores in November of 2019 after its US-based parent company filed for bankruptcy. In total, about 900,000 square feet was vacated, with much of it being scooped up by YM Inc. as temporary leases for its own banners.
Exterior of soon-to-open Forever 21 store at Metropolis at Metrotown. Photo courtesy of Srushti Gangdev on Twitter
YM Inc. launched Forever 21’s Canadian e-commerce website in early 2020. Forever 21 partnered with cross-border e-commerce solutions provider Global-e to launch the international offering, which included localized websites for the Canadian market as well as sites for Asia, Asia/Pacific, and Latin America.
YM Inc. owns several fashion retail banners in Canada including Urban Planet, Urban Behaviour, Sirens, Bluenotes, Suzy Shier, Stitches, West 49, and Amnesia. In 2019 Retail Insider reported that YM was bringing the Aéropostale retail banner back into the Canadian market after the US brand’s bankruptcy in 2016. YM Inc. was founded in 1975 with the opening of a Stitches store in downtown Toronto and the company has since grown rapidly with more than 650 stores across its banners and thousands of employees.
Forever 21’s re-launch in Canada comes at a time of intense competition amongst fashion retailers with various fast-fashion and value-priced retailers continuing to operate within Canada. Swedish fast-fashion retailer H&M had been opening stores yearly in Canada before the pandemic in an effort to gain market share, as has Spanish chain Zara and Japanese retailer Uniqlo. At the same time, value-priced retailers such as TJX Group’s Winners and Marshalls have been expanding further into Canada, offering designer product at discounted prices.
Exterior of Harry Rosen store at Square One. Photo: Harry Rosen
Iconic luxury menswear retailer Harry Rosen has built its successful business over the last seven decades focused around personalized interactions with clients.
The COVID-19 pandemic, along with its mandatory closures and public health measures, has dramatically changed the retail landscape in the country, and Harry Rosen has been at the forefront in the industry in accelerating its digital transformation to meet the changing marketplace.
Ian Rosen, Executive Vice-President of Digital and Strategy for the company, said its online sales grew in 2020 by almost three times.
“Our online storefront is now our largest storefront and we don’t expect it to go back. And it shot up to just over 20 percent of our business,” he said, adding that the e-commerce site has more sales than its flagship stores on Bloor Street in Toronto and CF Pacific Centre in Vancouver.
Rosen, who has been in his current role since June 2018, said the company was seeing sales growth in its e-commerce initiatives prior to the pandemic.
“We just happened to hit 2023 targets in 2020,” he said.
Harry Rosen (Founder), Ian Rosen (Vice President of Digital and Strategy), and Larry Rosen (Chairman and CEO). Photo: CNW Group/Harry Rosen Inc.
“I think there will be a level set but the way in which our business has grown has been I think a little bit different than others who have seen the big increase in e-commerce. So obviously we’ve seen a number of transactions move onto our digital channels and we’ve acquired a number of new clients who have never shopped with us before through our online channel.
“But we’ve also digitized a lot of our relationships between our clothing advisors, our team that works in the stores and their clients, and moved those online. One of the things that we were working on pre-pandemic and optimized during the pandemic is the idea that if I were your clothing advisor, rather than you going to the website and browsing for things, we’ve actually enabled our team to be able to curate the website, down to your sizes. Perhaps you have a particular style. I can send it over to you with a few clicks of a button and you can check it out.”
Recently, Harry Rosen chose the Qualtrics XM Platform to digitize and scale its retail model and deliver more targeted and personalized experiences to shoppers and employees across the business.
“Our philosophy as a company has always been to listen to the client. What made my grandfather so successful when he started the business was starting to collect modern CRM-type information from a client. He’d put that on a Post-It note and he had a big Rolodex. He would remember your birthday. He would remember your significant other’s name and he’d remember your kids’ names and their birthdays. That kind of led to a lot of loyalty,” said Ian Rosen.
“So kind of embedded in our DNA has been this idea of know your customer, listen to your customer, always be there to reach out to them. However, one of the things that’s become more and more challenging as our business has grown is getting real time, consistent, in the moment feedback from our teams and being able to act on that in a coordinated way.
“So when we started to look at our strategy moving forward we asked whose guidance are we going to follow. Are we going to work off of the customers giving us feedback or are we going to go proactively ask for more feedback? Our executive team as well as our leaders in the customer experience side of the business said we learn 10 times more when we get unsolicited feedback or when we send out a quick survey and we’ll learn two or three things and a steady manageable stream of that would be insanely valuable for us.”
Highly-interactive Harry Rosen website.
Ian Rosen said the company has partnered with Qualtrics to integrate their solution into its business with a commitment to getting customer feedback.
With Qualtrics, Harry Rosen will use deep customer insights from areas such as shopping preferences, packaging, and delivery and post-purchase to continuously elevate both its in-store and online experience. The retailer will apply these insights across the business, including — but not limited to — merchandise selection, store & e-commerce experience, marketing communications, and clothing advisor training.
The menswear brand is also boosting its employee experience program, leveraging Qualtrics to get to the heart of workforce feedback and concerns and quickly identify where action needs to be taken.
“For 67 years, everything we’ve achieved has been anchored by our people doing whatever it takes to help our clients in big and important moments,” said Ian Rosen. “Qualtrics allows us to scale up what we’re good at by keeping us focused on what matters — and by getting us the data and information to help us mobilize and act as quickly as possible.
“The pandemic has really pushed us as leaders to understand that the reality our employees are facing is changing, it’s uncertain, and having a feedback mechanism for them to give us input, for them to bring light to where perhaps somebody’s leadership style isn’t translating into a remote environment as well as they were in person, and their team is feeling a little bit stressed by the situation, we can pick that up in surveys and action against it. We also could just monitor morale.
Interior of Harry Rosen store at Square One Shopping Centre. Photo: Harry Rosen
Interior of Harry Rosen Store at the Rideau Centre. Photo: Harry Rosen
Interior of Harry Rosen Store. Photo: Harry Rosen
“One of the benefits we have of being a ‘legacy’ company . . . we’ve reinvented ourselves before. We’ve had to confront market conditions and changes and client behaviours and changes maybe not to this level of acceleration but it actually was the muscle that we had built over the years. So we had a pretty big ship to turn and pivot with and we actually were pretty successful in orienting people around it at different ways of thinking of our business. Digital is going to be the first touch point that we prepare for. So we need to make sure that we’re encouraging customers to engage with our digital properties, we’re encouraging our staff to engage with it, we’re encouraging the information to be up to date, accurate, and translate into the different systems. That’s kind of like the marketplace and the stores are a place where people come to pick things up or have a different type of shopping experience. I prefer the word transformation than pivot because I think pivot means you can pivot back. It’s true transformation in the way we think about our business.”
Qualtrics is the world’s No. 1 Experience Management (XM) platform and creator of the XM category, with over 13,500 organizations around the world using it to listen, understand, and take action on experience data — the beliefs, emotions, and intentions that tell you why things are happening, and what to do about it. Its platform is a system of action that helps businesses attract customers who stay longer and buy more, engage employees who build a positive culture, develop breakthrough products people love, and build a brand people are passionate about.
“The companies who have emerged as leaders in the face of COVID-19 are constantly listening to their customers and employees, acting quickly on the insights, and closing feedback loops at a higher rate than others,” said Jay Choi, Chief Product Officer, Qualtrics. “Harry Rosen has always shown an industry-leading commitment to creating flawless experiences — and with Qualtrics, they can leverage the digital tools and insights necessary to broaden their reach and drive meaningful results by serving customers at every step of the journey.”
Rendering of the newly-renovated Hudson's Bay store and office building extension. Rendering: Menkes Shooner Dagenais LeTourneux
The Hudson’s Bay Company has provided some initial insights into the future of its physical department stores in Canada. On Monday in a joint statement, HBC and RioCan formally announced the redevelopment of the downtown Montreal flagship Hudson’s Bay store which will see an overhaul to become a ‘store of the future’ as consumers increasingly shift spending online.
“We are reimagining the Hudson’s Bay retail experience in Downtown Montreal, creating a digitally-connected store with elevated service and a curated assortment to showcase the best of what Hudson’s Bay has to offer,” said Iain Nairn, President and CEO of Hudson’s Bay.
“This project presents an opportunity to establish a multi-functional store that continues to offer the brands and services that Canadians trust us to deliver, while developing new uses for space — such as showrooms or concierge services — that reflect the modern lifestyles of our customers and the vibrancy of Downtown Montreal.”
Iain Nairn
The shift addresses a rapid consumer movement online at a time when Hudson’s Bay is also enhancing its overall digital operations. TheBay.com is launching a new Marketplace with more than 500 vendors as the retailer continues to shift its operations amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Hudson’s Bay Company is already capitalizing on its ecommerce assets, including spinning off Saks Fifth Avenue’s Saks.com website into its own business. No similar announcements have been made for the Canadian website which is one of the most visited in Canada in terms of overall web traffic.
The Oakridge Centre Hudson’s Bay store in Vancouver, which shut early this year and is set to reopen in 2024 after the shopping centre overhaul is completed, will also feature the ‘store of the future’ fit out, with digital technology being used to enhance the overall customer experience. This will include a showroom concept that connects to HBC’s extended aisle and marketplace offerings with enhanced pick-up and return options to create a more seamless consumer experience. Given the significant investment required to update its stores, analysts are saying that it’s unlikely that Hudson’s Bay will continue to operate all 87 of its current stores. Locations in downtown WinnipegandJardins Dorvalin Montreal shuttered recently and a downtown Edmonton location is set to close next month according to staff.
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Rendering of the newly-renovated Hudson's Bay office building extension. Rendering: Menkes Shooner Dagenais LeTourneux
View of the newly-renovated Hudson's Bay store from Sainte-Catherine Street. Rendering: Menkes Shooner Dagenais LeTourneux
Side rendering of the newly-renovated Hudson's Bay store and office building extension on Union Avenue. Rendering: Menkes Shooner Dagenais LeTourneux
Aerial rendering of the newly-renovated Hudson's Bay office building extension facing west. Rendering: Menkes Shooner Dagenais LeTourneux
Aerial rendering of the newly-renovated Hudson's Bay office building extension on the Sainte-Catherine Street side. Rendering: Menkes Shooner Dagenais LeTourneux
Aerial rendering of the newly-renovated Hudson's Bay office building extension. Rendering: Menkes Shooner Dagenais LeTourneux
Prior to the pandemic, sources confirmed that Hudson’s Bay was in talks to launch concession departments within its stores, including bringing in outside operators to manage jewellery and footwear departments. It is unclear if the private company will continue on that path given the pandemic and some of the financial challenges that the company has faced amid declining sales at its stores that were shut due to lockdowns.
Hudson’s Bay is taking advantage of its vast real estate with plans to capitalize on the value through redevelopment and other means. “As consumers continue to evolve the way they live, work, and shop, we are committed to capitalizing on these shifts, while unleashing the full potential of our prime properties throughout North America and reinvigorating the urban districts in which they are situated,” said Ian Putnam, President and CEO, HBC Properties and Investments. “HBCPI is excited to lead the way to unlock the value and potential of our joint venture portfolio for our most significant flagship properties throughout Canada.”
The Montreal store redevelopment, which Retail Insider reported on in February, will see an overhaul of The Bay store that will include a reduction in size to about 295,000 square feet. The retail building currently spans 655,000 square feet and was built in phases between 1891 and 1960 for retail tenant, Henry Morgan, which operated there until 1972 after being acquired by the Hudson’s Bay Company.
The Hudson’s Bay Company and RioCan own or control 10 properties comprising more than three million square feet in Canada, including the downtown Montreal Hudson’s Bay store. Costs for redevelopment will be shared on a proportionate basis with Hudson’s Bay owning 79.8% of the partnership and RioCan having the remaining 20.2%.
Jonathan Gitlin, President and CEO, RioCan, said, “RioCan is looking forward to the transformation of this iconic property to meet evolving consumer and office user expectations. This highly-attractive, transit-oriented site in the heart of Downtown Montreal will be revitalized and expanded with resilient uses and offer forward-thinking amenities driving value creation for the long-term.”
The Downtown Montreal mixed-use redevelopment project will include the construction of a 25-storey office tower of approximately one million square feet as well as the transformation of Hudson’s Bay’s existing retail space. HBC says that it is working closely with the City of Montreal and other stakeholders to finalize details.
The heritage building’s original architecture will be protected, including restoration of the facades, the reopening of windows, and the return of display window showcases to their original state. Four tiered terraces will be created on the four green roofs of the office tower. The main entrance and tallest part of the tower will be on the de Maisonneuve Boulevard side of the complex which had been intended for a 200,000-square-foot Saks Fifth Avenue store that never came to fruition after being announced in 2016.
A public consultation process is now underway for the downtown Montreal Bay redevelopment. The project is expected to be underway by 2023 with completion targeted for 2027. The Hudson’s Bay flagship store on Sainte-Catherine Street will continue to operate throughout the construction process according to the company.
The office tower, which will be clad in a glass curtain, will be “among the most avant-garde in Montreal and will represent the future of the workplace”, according to HBC in a statement. “The Partners will focus on employee well-being and concern for the environment, while respecting the heritage of the flagship building.”
The new tower will satisfy LEED standards and will feature large, flexible floor plates of up to 60,000 square feet as well as high ceilings and a biophilic design that will allow for maximum natural light exposure.
“The Hudson’s Bay redevelopment project represents the next chapter in HBC’s retail history and its continued commitment to Montreal,” said Richard Hamori, COO, Streetworks Development, the real estate development arm of HBC Properties and Investments. “We intend to honour the heritage of our flagship building, as well as that of historic Sainte-Catherine Street, while expressing our confidence in the future of Montreal’s downtown. This project is another step towards our goal of maximizing the value of our portfolio of downtown properties throughout North America, while diversifying our holdings to a mix of retail, residential and office space.”
The Montreal redevelopment is part of a larger revitalization of the area surrounding Philips Square which itself is seeing significant improvements. Sainte-Catherine Street is undergoing a multi-year overhaul as are Ivanhoé Cambridge properties such as Montreal Eaton Centre and Place Ville Marie.
WANT Apothecary store at 2579 Yonge St., Toronto. Photo: WANT Apothecary
The physical retail spaces for Montreal-based WANT Apothecary have shut down as the brand pivots to an ecommerce business while refocusing on its core brand. The tasteful, highly-curated retail concept launched 10 years ago and at one time had five stores in major cities in Canada and the United States.
WANT Apothecary was the brainchild of WANT Les Essentiels Co-Founders and brothers, Byron and Dexter Peart, along with business partners, Mark Wiltzer and Jacqueline Gelber. The brothers sold the business to Wiltzer and Gelber (who own Mark Edwards Apparel Inc.) in 2017, including the upscale WANT Les Essentials brand that they founded in 2007, and exited the company.
The WANT Apothecary concept was unique in how it mirrored the style of a classic apothecary while also mixing a selection of fashion items from some of the world’s leading designers. Products included women’s and men’s ready-to-wear, as well as accessories, leather goods, footwear, and various gift items, not to mention an assortment of beauty products, hence the apothecary name.
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WANT Apothecary store at 4960 Sherbrooke St. W. Westmount, Quebec. Photo: WANT Apothecary
WANT Apothecary store at 1070 Yonge St., Toronto. Photo: WANT Apothecary
The Peart brothers, along with their business partners, launched the first WANT Apothecary location in Montreal in 2011, in the city’s affluent Westmount area. The beautiful store located at 4960 Sherbrooke Street West was buoyed by the existing brand recognition of the WANT Les Essentiels lifestyle brand that had launched five years earlier. After testing and perfecting the Montreal store, the business partners set out to open a second location in Toronto’s upscale Rosedale retail area at 1070 Yonge Street in 2013, followed by a Vancouver store located in the South Granville shopping area at 2956 Granville Street which debuted in 2014. In 2017, WANT Apothecary opened a Toronto location at 2579 Yonge Street as well as a store in New York City at The NoMad Hotel at 1170 Broadway.
Co-founder, Dexter Peart, told Retail Insider in an interview in 2017 that rather than locating in malls or on popular retail streets such as Bloor Street West or Robson Street, WANT Apothecary’s locations sought to create a “curated experience within close proximity to the consumer” that was the “antithesis to a large shopping experience”. Collections in the stores were highly curated to reflect the retailer’s aesthetic, and each store was typically between 1,700 and 2,000 square feet to ensure a more intimate experience.
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Interior of WANT Apothecary store in NYC. Photo: WANT Apothecary
Interior of WANT Apothecary store in NYC. Photo: WANT Apothecary
Interior of WANT Apothecary store in Lawrence Park, Toronto. Photo: WANT Apothecary
Interior of WANT Apothecary store in Lawrence Park, Toronto. Photo: WANT Apothecary
Interior of WANT Apothecary store in Lawrence Park, Toronto. Photo: WANT Apothecary
The WANT brand has moved to an ecommerce model after shutting its physical stores. And as the multi-brand apothecary concept shuts stores, the WANT Les Essentials brand is being moved to the forefront.
“We are excited to announce that we will be focusing all efforts on our house brand, beginning with a new website launching in April and ready-to-wear collections releasing throughout the year,” stated the company. “As we pursue this vision, we’ve decided to close our WANT Apothecary locations and consolidate both WANT websites to wantlesessentiels.com. This new experience will be the digital home for WANT Les Essentiels and stock several of the skincare, beauty, and home brands you know and love.”
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We reported this spring that Australian beauty brand Aesop had opened a new store in the former WANT Apothecary location at 2579 Yonge Street in Toronto.
Retailers have been struggling amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Some are finding that the expense of having leases is too great and some have been closing locations as a result. At the same time, studies have shown that having a physical retail presence helps drive online web traffic, bringing WANT’s ecommerce-only strategy into question in terms of future growth for the brand.
Food affordability in Canada is becoming an increasing worry.
The two necessities in life are food and shelter. It looks like both are getting much more expensive these days. For a few years now, the cost of food has been the most important food affordability barrier. Not anymore. The cost of housing is now seen by Canadians as the most significant barrier.
A recent poll conducted by Grassroots Public Affairs, in partnership with Food Banks Canada, shows how things have changed in just twelve months. A total of 46% of Canadians, almost half, consider the cost of housing to be the largest obstacle to food affordability. Only 12 months ago, it was 21%. A total of 29% of Canadians see the cost of housing as a larger obstacle now compared to 12 months ago. Rising unemployment was the largest obstacle for 71% last year, for obvious reasons. The percentage dropped to 42% this year, which is the same percentage as the cost of food. Indeed, the cost of food is still seen as an important barrier, but concerns related to food prices have now been surpassed by lodging costs.
Seeing house prices go up is not necessarily undesirable. After all, most Canadians rely on the value of their property to increase their wealth and support their retirement. Taxing capital gains on primary residences would be aiming at the wrong problem and would make many Canadians poorer. But the rate at which prices are going up is alarming. The OCDE recently reported that over the last 20 years, Canadian house prices on average have gone up by more than 1680%, the highest rate amongst all OCDE countries. The second highest is not even close at 96%, which is the United Kingdom. So, this is a real issue in Canada.
Canadians are facing a perfect storm when looking at food affordability. The cost to put a roof over one’s head is going up while food prices are expected to go up by as much as 5% this year. Furthermore, the economy is slowly picking up the pace, but the number of jobs is still short by 500,000 from what the Canadian job market had before the pandemic. Naturally, many Canadians are concerned about the professional situation.
Given these macroeconomic shifts in recent years, Canada is now on the list of countries facing challenges of ensuring food security for many of its citizens. There are no problems with food availability in Canada, none, except perhaps for the greater north, however, the cost of essential elements in our lives coupled with the fact that salaries are barely moving to help Canadians deal with higher expenses is worrying.
Ottawa will need to get a better a sense of the real estate market conditions beyond the pandemic as interest rates may remain at historic lows for some time. When real estate prices go up, rents will eventually catch up to tenants who can only dream about owning a house one day. We are already seeing rental costs going up in Canada, from 3% to 5% in some markets.
Because of the pandemic, some markets are more affected than others. Interestingly, the work-from-home phenomena is impacting smaller markets, not just urban ones. Many do not have to live within commuting distance from their jobs. According to the Canadian Real Estate Association, the greatest year-over-year percentage changes came from the Northwest Territories (48.1%), Nova Scotia (30.4%), Ontario (24.5%), Quebec (22.5%), and New Brunswick (20.9%). Many economists believe a supply-deprived real estate market is driving prices higher. Increasing supplies in markets where demand is higher than ever, urban, or not, should be our governments’ priority.
The pandemic has also rejuvenated our collective discussion of a guaranteed minimum income. The pandemic itself has given us data on how Canadians behave when receiving financial aid from governments. We still know very little about how a guaranteed minimum income would help families cope with changing real estate conditions and higher housing costs. The fabric of our workforce will also change due to the pandemic. Now, more than ever perhaps, is time to have that conversation. Committing to nationally-coordinated pilot projects to assess such a program is long overdue.
