Codata Factsheet – Gand

In September 2021, Codata listed 844 Shops in the city centre of Ghent. They are located within the Shopping Streets and two shopping centres “City Shopping Center Gent-Zuid” and “Kouterdreef.”

For more than 10 years, the vacancy rate has been below the Belgian city centres average. Yet the vacancy rate has been increasing since 2013, with the exception of a slight decrease from 9.3 % to 9.1 % between 2018 and 2019.

Between 2020 and 2021, the vacancy rate has gone up from 11.2 % to 12.7 %.

Most activities have remained relatively stable between 2020 and 2021.

The activity “Clothing” declined once again, losing 16 shops in 2021 (there were 210 occupied locations in 2020 while they dropped to 194 in 2021).

Conversely the activity “Café-Hotel-Restaurant” is taking up again: 234 shops in 2021 compared to 225 in 2020. In 2019, the number of points of sale was also 234.

The categories “Clothing” and “Café-Hotel-Restaurant” represent 23.0 % and 27.7 % of all city centre shops respectively. These rates are above the 2020 national average: 19.2 % for “Clothing” and 20.4 % for “Café-Hotel-Restaurant.” On the other hand, “Services” represent only 8.1 % of all shops whereas at national level they represent 14.2 % of all shops in 2020.

Despite the rising rate 2020, the Retailers occupancy rate has decreased from 34. 5 % to 32.5 % in 2021.

Newcomers include Retailers “Courir” and “Dunkin” as well as the opening of a second supermarket for the Dutch Retailer “Albert Heijn.”