Retailers and brands across the country are impressed with the current recovery considering that malls in various cities continue to operate with various restrictions in place.
A number of prominent malls in key cities such as Chandigarh, Delhi NCR and Bengaluru have reported a sharper rebound in the months of June and July this year compared with the same period in 2020. Sales in some locations have reached 70 – 80 per cent of pre-pandemic levels.
Malls such as Select Citywalk in Delhi have resorted to crowd control by intermittently closing the gates in peak hours amid surges in footfall. Retailers meanwhile remain hopeful that a third wave of the Covid-19 infection does not strike the country before Diwali in November.
According to Nirupa Shankar, Executive Director, Brigade Group, which operates two malls in Bengaluru, the average daily footfall in the current reopening of malls has doubled to around 10,000 each day.
