Avenue Champs-Elysées: 1st European high street to return to pre-Covid levels
The most beautiful avenue in the world is getting back its color after several years of gloom.
Between May 2021 and June 2022, the average monthly footfall in front of a store more than doubled: each month, 880,000 pedestrians pass in front of a store on the street.
Between May 2020 and June 2021, that number was 435,000. The first two months of 2022 even have a higher level of foot traffic than in 2020 before Covid. Note that the "Gilets jaunes" crisis was still weighing on the attendance of the avenue in 2019 and early 2020.
The Avenue des Champs-Élysées is the avenue that has rebounded the best since the crisis, compared to all the major iconic streets in 7 European capitals: Oxford Street in London, Gran Via in Madrid, Leidsestraat in Amsterdam, Via Corso in Rome, Kurfürstendamm in Berlin and Rue Neuve in Brussels.
Key learnings include:
- Pedestrians are returning faster than expected;
- The major retailers are demonstrating their power of attraction;
- Prices are stabilizing and commercial vacancy is decreasing;
- Economic operators are taking hold of the city's issues.
Why this comparative analysis of pedestrian flows in Europe?
After two years of pandemic, the rise of home office and the growth of e-commerce, the evolution of the streets that concentrate the most visitors and attract the highest rental rates is particularly watched by the market, as it reveals the transformations to come.
The European High Street Ranking compares the dynamics of the prime streets in 7 European capitals (London, Berlin, Madrid, Rome, Brussels, Amsterdam, Paris) based on a single metric: the increase in pedestrian traffic over the past 12 months. Cushman & Wakefield Retail's experts in each country analyse the reaction of the Commercial Real Estate market: price trends, retailer and landlord behaviour.
