Leisure is critical for post-covid retail return to prosperity

Michael Harrison, Co-Founder and COO of UK-based active leisure specialist Gravity tells Real Asset Day how the company is well-positioned for a post-pandemic retail world in which leisure will be critical. Covid-19 has accelerated the retail market’s thinking on the direction the sector needs to take to return to prosperity, according to Harrison. Landlords are coming around to the idea that leisure cannot be a secondary component of a shopping centre anymore, it needs to be front and centre as part of the retail environment,” he explains. It is widely known that retailer fortunes, on the high street and in shopping centres, have been dwindling for some time says Harrison adding: “The pandemic has sped up what I have been preaching for the last five years – that leisure needs to be an integral part of the high street in the shopping mall."