Sylvia Park opening 'like running of the bulls'

Angus McNaughton woke at 3.30am yesterday, fretting that no one would visit Sylvia Park.

So he left his South Auckland home and drove to the mall at 4.30am to find one man already waiting for the doors to open and desperate to be the first customer.

"We gave that man a voucher for $100 of shopping," said Mr McNaughton, delighted at the first day's consumer rush.

By dawn, shoppers were converging on the centre and later in the morning, trucks could not unload goods into The Warehouse Extra.

As chief executive of Kiwi Income Property Trust, the mall's developer, Mr McNaughton was pleased with the shopping frenzy, described by one staff member from The Warehouse as "a terrifying stampede of people rushing at us, men trailing children."

He described the opening as being like the running of the bulls in Spain's Pamplona.

Gavin Parker, Kiwi's chief financial officer, was also happy with shopper numbers. But both were coy about whether Kiwi would upgrade its yield projections on the centre after more shops were added.

Retailers in the $388 million shopping hub will pay Kiwi $27 million rent annually, yielding 7 per cent for investors who previously questioned whether the centre would succeed.

Kiwi's annual report is due out this month and will feature the completed centre.

The trust will hold its annual meeting in Tauranga in August but plans to stage next year's meeting in one of Sylvia Park's cinemas, which are under construction.

The building schedule for the centre's first 50 shops which opened yesterday ran three weeks ahead of schedule, Mr McNaughton said, allowing retailers to fit out the areas ahead of time.

Retailers were paying from $500 per square metre to more than $2000 per square metre, he said. Premium areas include 60sq m standalone shops on corner areas and outlets in the park's food court.