Westgate Mall bets on improved security, new activities to up foot traffic

Westgate Mall in Westlands, Nairobi, has enhanced security in a bid to woo more shoppers. [File, Standard]

Nairobi City has recently witnessed increased construction of malls, creating an oversupply in lettable spaces and leaving many spaces empty years later after completion.

The empty spaces have been due to the collapse of giant retail supermarket chains such as Nakumatt, Uchumi, Tuskys, Shoprite, among others.

However, for shrewd ones, they have employed strategies to increase mall traffic by attracting more tenants and shoppers.

One of them is Westgate Mall in Westlands, Nairobi. The mall has enhanced security, increased tenants and activities in a bid to woo in more shoppers after reopening in 2015 due to a terrorist attack. This has been driven by heightened security measures, expansion of recreational activities and spaces, and the entry of new luxury retail and restaurant openings -increasing consumer confidence and making it a bustling centre for shopping and entertainment.

Westgate Mall Deputy Marketing Manager Victor Oreyo, since 2015, the mall has been working hard to increase the traffic of shoppers.

“We look at traffic every single day and work towards it. The traffic is good and growing compared to before. We decided to capture more of our clientele that are not aware of what we are serving, and traffic has grown into six figures,” Oreyo told Real Estate at the mall recently.

“There has been a lot of demand to bring back Maasai Market, which stopped since we reopened back in 2015 and yet people knew that it was one of the best, and therefore we decided to bring it back now happens every Tuesday and Wednesday at the second-floor parking space.”

Oreyo said during the Maasai Market days, they direct vehicles to the third floor, with the basement being the largest. 

The exhibitors pay a minimal fee of about Sh5,000 and operate from 9am to 6pm or 7pm.

On activities, the Strikez bowling, which opened in February 2021, has a restaurant for soft and hard drinks nearby, air hockey, foosball and pool games are the new attractions and close till late at 12am to 2am. There is also a cinema with a section for regulars, which opened in 2017 and a VIPS in 2022.

Oreyo said the mall is now disability-friendly after the installation of a machine to lift people.

The 350,000 square feet mall, with a Gross Lettable Area space of between 263,142 square feet and 267,881 square feet, is fully let. It now has most of the world’s biggest brands, including the recent Tommy Hilfiger.

The US-based brand opened its first-ever store in East Africa at the mall in early January and has also been pulling high-net-worth shoppers.

French’s sportswear brand Lacoste will be opening soon to add to the already existing luxury brands in the mall’s portfolio, including Adidas, Hugo Boss and Mango.