You only have to be in Asia just a few hours to realise the world is now truly divided into the ‘old’ and the ‘new’.

You only have to be in Asia just a few hours to realise the world is now truly divided into the ‘old’ and the ‘new’.

The energy and dynamism of a city like Singapore is completely infectious, and the way that everyone appears to embrace the new is mind-boggling. It doesn’t seem many years ago that retailers would make regular trips to the US for a dose of retail therapy and inspiration. Today, the direction has moved firmly eastwards.

Listening to presentations at the congress, this impression was only compounded by the scale of the statistics on the pace of change and the size of the retail prize.

Given that Asia is developing a modern retail infrastructure from a low base, the story centres around opening as much physical space as fast as possible.

The managing director of Chow Tai Fook, one of China’s largest jewellery chains, said that it opened 200 stores in mainland China last year alone. It opened its first shop in China in 1998, reached 1,000 in 2010 and is on course for 2,000 by 2014.

Adidas said that it reached 1,200 stores in 2012 and was opening up to three a day. And when one of the biggest
shopping mall developers in Asia, CapitaMalls, was asked whether China was heading towards over-capacity, the deputy chief executive said that if Singapore has 5 million people and 19 malls, China’s 1.2 billion people need more than the current 2,000 malls.

It is not all about physical space though. How could it be when we were told that 513 million people are online in China alone and that Asia Pacific will this year overtake North America as the world’s biggest market for online sales?

Evidence of that tipping point is everywhere in Singapore where it seems that everyone, from young to old, was connected to their smartphones all the time.

Tesco boss Philip Clarke talked about retailing having to “retool for the 21st century” in his speech. The backdrop of Asia seemed a very appropriate place to see that “retooling” unfold before our eyes.

  • Ian McGarrigle, Congress director, World Retail Congress