Assess Freeport Leisure's successful response to the opportunities offered by a changing retail environment.

Case Study: Freeport Leisure plc

Factory outlet retailing grew in the 1990s out of the desire of US factory outlet developers to tap new overseas markets for a retail format which was reaching saturation in the home market. In the US factory outlet centres were sizeable, upmarket, out-of-town malls in which fashion and household goods were sold. This gave manufacturers a chance to retail end-of-season and experimental stock at a considerable mark-down - 30-50 per cent from high-street prices. The UK was regarded as a key entrypoint to the European market, which was targeted by a number of developers, among them McArthur Glen, Value Retail, Prime and RAM Eurocenters.

The UK already had a history of factory shopping, and prior to the US entrants two small indigenous schemes, influenced by experience of the US market, had already been developed in England. In 1993, the large US developers had plans to develop over 30 centres in the UK within 3-4 years. At this point in time, however, the UK government was changing its stance towards out-of-town shopping provision due to the impact on town centres of large out-of-town retail park and regional shopping centre developments during the late 1980s. Subsequent problems in gaining planning permission slowed down the development programmes of the US factory outlet developers and gave Freeport Leisure, a UK organisation founded in 1994, a window of opportunity with which to develop and promote a mutated form of the original US format. The Freeport concept incorporated manufacturer and retailer outlets together with leisure provision, originally on a smaller scale more acceptable to the UK planning regime.

Freeport Leisure plc grew to become one of Europe's leading factory outlet developers. The outlet centres run by the organisation included the UK's earliest factory outlet centre at Hornsea (opened 1994) together with centres in: Fleetwood (opened 1995); West Lothian (opened 1996); Talke (opened 1999); Castleford (opened 1999); Braintree (opened 1999). The early centres, small by US factory outlet standards, were approximately 80000 square feet, but the latter UK openings included a development of 250000 sq. ft in Castleford, with 85 shops, while the Braintree development near London was 180000 sq. ft in size, with 80 shops.Freeport Leisure also entered the mainland European market with openings in Gothenburg in Sweden in 2001, and Kleinhaugsdorf on the Czech-Austrian border in 2003. In the same year further sites were under development and openings were planned for Lisbon, Portugal and Roppenheim, France. The pattern towards larger-scale developments was clear; the site in Portugal was over half a million square feet in size, with 200 outlets, 30 restaurants and a 21 screen multiplex.