MetLife: E-commerce growth to fall around the rate of brick & mortar retail sales growth in the 2030s

Investors may want to target retail centers with experience-focused tenants, such as restaurants, showrooms, event space and activities, according to MetLife Investment Management in its white paper, “A New Dawn in Retail.”

Goods-based retailers are increasingly using their stores as showrooms, to help boost their online sales. The result is less need for inventory, and less need for a large-format space. MetLife’s analysis of lease signings across more than 150 retailers suggests this trend is underway, with the median store footprint decreasing by 1.2 percent between 2017 and 2018. MetLife believes it will continue shrinking in the years to come, with continued focus being on centers with experience-based offerings, as well as centers with smaller spaces or with layouts that could be subdivided into smaller spaces in the future.

Grocery-anchored retail offerings are also downsizing, which has been driven by international grocers who have been able to leverage t