BERO Centre, Oberhausen

Keeping retail customers happy

The BERO Centre sits in direct proximity of Oberhausen’s city centre and railway station, housing over 100 stores, a gym and a range of medical surgeries and practices.

To safeguard the BERO’s position in the local retail market and sustain  a growing number of visitors by enhancing the centre’s retail offering, Zenprop and Kintyre Investments  employed Gleeds to project and cost manage an extensive refurbishment and extension. The project transformed the 28,000 m2 centre into a 45,000 m² retail hub over a two-year construction period, without any major interruption to trading.

Smoothly executed extension and refurbishment

To protect shopper accessibility during construction, Gleeds’ team of consultants carried out careful negotiations with all existing tenants. A detailed phased delivery strategy was developed to accommodate tenant trading requirements.

Keeping cost under control

Gleeds held overall financial responsibility for the refurbishment and extension works. This included cost management and financial modelling services, which required daily supervision and management of the project supply chain.

Protecting accessibility

We reorganised and relocated public and internal road infrastructure to maintain clear and easy access during and post construction. Parking facilities were combined in a central new car park, which formed phase 1 of the overall construction programme and therefore secured comfortable parking access for the increased number of visitors during construction and upon re-launch.

Retailers directly impacted by extension works were proactively re-located to avoid undue disruption. An independently operated McDonald’s restaurant, situated on the development land, adjacent to the centre, was also moved to free up the extension area on site and in order to provide a better access from the main road

A key role for Gleeds from beginning to completion

Due to the international set-up of the Client - and Zenprop actively managing the project from their South-African and London offices - Gleeds was asked to operate a central role as representative of the client for all technical matters during the re-development programme. All commercial decisions were carefully assessed in close liaison with Kintyre. Even now, Gleeds continues to advise and support our client on new lease contracts and several Capex measures.

Key to smooth delivery was early engagement and negotiation of urban development contracts with the council, including land swap and right of access agreements. We also coordinated and managed the letting team for all newly acquired tenants and associated lease agreements from an economical and technical point of view.

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Felix Behrndt

Felix Behrndt
Managing Director, Germany