INSIDE THE SPOTLIGHT RETAIL, PROPERTY REVOLUTION
RETAIL group Spotlight is on track to open 150 new stores across its three brands over the next five years.
It has already welcomed customers to 24 new outlets in the past 12 months, despite Covid disruptions. The most recent at the company’s $45m development in Maroochydore on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland.
The project features the biggest ever haberdashery-focused Spotlight store at over 6000sq m, anchoring a superstore of camping and outdoor brand Anaconda and a homewares-centred Harris Scarfe that are both also owned by the Spotlight Group.
Spotlight’s billionaire executive deputy chairman and co-owner Zac Fried calls it the biggest and best project he has ever done.
The privately-owned Spotlight has plans for 28 more stores to open this year and another 15 are already approved for 2023.
Spotlight traces it roots back to Mr Fried’s late father Ruben and uncle Morry Fraid, the group’s executive chairman, who opened the first Spotlight store in suburban Melbourne in 1973.
Almost 50 years later, the Maroochydore opening is only the first stage of what will eventually be a $250m project.
Mr Fried said there are plans to transform the Spotlight group from a pure retailer into one of Australia’s more prolific property developers over the next decade and more.
The group will also soon build hotels, apartments and mixed-use property projects all over the east coast of Australia.
Spotlight’s owners already have about $2bn worth of property on their books amassed over several years.
The massive retail business that now has 11,500 employees and annual sales of $2.6bn.