Elevating essentials: Activating the next phase of Region’s growth
Stepping into the role of Chief Operating Officer at Region Group, I’m incredibly conscious of the responsibility and the privilege that comes with helping shape the places people rely on every day. Across our portfolio, we see the real-world impact of cost-of-living pressures on households. Yet we also see something equally powerful: the enduring strength and stability of essential retail, and the increasingly important role our centres play in the daily rhythm of Australian life.
Our centres are where people pick up groceries after work, grab a coffee on a Saturday morning, take children to play, attend health appointments, visit the bank or pharmacy, and increasingly access community support and shared services. They are places woven into everyday life – valued for their essential role rather than as destinations.
As our operating environment evolves, so too does our role. The year ahead is about activating the potential within our portfolio, moving from resilience to progress, and ensuring our centres continue to deliver value not just through the assets themselves, but through the experiences, services and community connection they enable.
From defensive to progressive retail ownership
The past few years demanded discipline and resilience, as we navigated rising costs, shifting household spending patterns and broader economic uncertainty. During that period, our focus was clear – protect portfolio strength, maintain leasing momentum and support our retailers.
Today, we’re in a different phase. Despite ongoing cost-of-living pressure, essential spending has remained steady, with households continuing to prioritise everyday needs. For Region, these dynamics reinforce the strength of our strategy. We’ve delivered major repositioning projects at Lavington Square (NSW), Pakenham Marketplace (VIC) and Miami One (QLD), lifting presentation, improving customer experience and strengthening the platform for retail outcomes.
Our capital recycling program has accelerated reinvestment, with $196.8 million of disposals redeployed into higher-yielding acquisitions and growth-aligned value creation initiatives, including early development planning at Greenbank Shopping Centre (NSW), North Orange Shopping Centre (NSW) and Marketown West (NSW). This has been complemented by targeted reinvestment across several centres, alongside continued investment in sustainability and last-mile fulfilment in partnership with our anchor tenants.
Importantly, leasing momentum remains a key signal of asset health. Our portfolio has delivered consistent positive leasing spreads over the past five years, indicating that our centres have moved beyond defensive performance and are now positioned for acceleration.
Retail centres as multi-role essential service hubs
One of the most significant shifts we’ve seen is how people now use local centres. Hybrid working has increased time spent closer to home, essential services are increasingly delivered locally, and communities are seeking places that feel practical, familiar and welcoming.
Our centres are evolving in response. They are now part retail network, part logistics interface, part health and services precinct, and an increasingly important piece of local social infrastructure.
Delacombe Town Centre is a clear example. The integration of a Woolworths local distribution centre within the retail precinct demonstrates how fulfilment, logistics and shopping can coexist, improving operational efficiency while supporting local trade.
We are also seeing sustained growth in health, wellness and allied medical offerings. In the first half of the financial year alone, we introduced 18 new health and services operators across metro and growth corridor centres. While not new categories, their increasing scale reinforces our role as everyday service hubs.
At a community level, initiatives such as the Uniform Exchange program reflect how our centres respond to practical local needs. Meanwhile, we are focused on improving safety, accessibility and comfort through refreshed lighting, resurfaced car parks, and improved wayfinding and signage.
As the largest owner of neighbourhood and convenience-based centres in Australia, we have both a platform and a responsibility to ensure these places evolve with the communities they serve.
Demand-led investment
Our investment approach is guided by a simple question: What will our communities need, not just now, but over the next decade? Strong population growth in suburban and regional Australia, combined with a structural undersupply of retail floorspace, reinforces the relevance of the 20-minute neighbourhood model, bringing essential services closer to home.
Our performance reflects this positioning. Comparable non-discretionary specialty sales increased by 3.3 per cent over 12 months as at December 2025. Low specialty occupancy costs continue to provide tenants with room to grow, while reinvestment initiatives support lifting productivity and long-term competitiveness. Where we see sustained structural demand, we lean in.
New-model partnerships: Co-investing in retail evolution
Partnerships have always been central to how we operate, but their nature is evolving. E-commerce and rapid fulfilment are reshaping how major retailers design their networks, and we are working more closely than ever with anchor tenants on layout evolution, loading efficiency, and hybrid operating models.
Our anchors now contribute nearly half of our rental income, driving deeper engagement, shared ambition and joint problem-solving.
Beyond the asset level, the continued expansion of our funds-management platform, including Metro Fund 2, reflects strong institutional confidence in essential retail and in Region’s capability as a specialist owner and operator. These partnerships are long-term, collaborative and focused on shaping the next generation of essential retail environments.
Curating relevance through targeted reinvestment
Reinvestment ensures our centres remain current, useful and relevant. Our approach is deliberately local. Development planning is progressing across growth-aligned assets, including Delacombe Town Centre Stage Two, Greenbank and North Orange, where a proposed ALDI introduction and parking upgrades complement existing Woolworths expansion works. With the first tranche of centre repositioning projects delivered, our focus is now shifting to the next phase, alongside the continued rollout of customer-experience centre enhancements.
Every project is guided by the same intent: enhance experience, lift performance and strengthen community connection through essential retail.
People, culture and partners as a competitive differentiator
Our people and partners sit at the heart of our performance. In a tight labour environment and an increasingly complex operating environment, culture, capability and collaboration are not ‘nice to haves’, rather they are fundamental to operational excellence. The way we show up, work together and make decisions directly shapes outcomes at every centre, every day.
That’s why in late-2025 we launched Our Promise, Region’s employee value proposition. Our Promise was intentionally designed as a clear give-and-get framework, articulating not only what our people can expect from Region, but what Region expects in return. It recognises that sustainable performance is built on mutual commitment, shared accountability and clarity of expectation.
What we give is intentional, meaningful opportunities for lateral growth and skills-based opportunities, clarity around expectations, the trust to make decisions and the support required to own outcomes. In return, we ask for ownership at every level, accountability for decisions and a commitment to working as one team. Our ‘no egos’ mindset is central to this. It encourages open dialogue, constructive challenges and collaboration across roles, functions and partners. By embedding Our Promise into how we lead, partner and operate, we are building a culture where expectations are clear, standards are shared and performance is collective.
Looking ahead
The fundamentals of essential retail remain strong. The communities we serve are growing, and demand for accessible, relevant local centres continues to rise. The year ahead is about activation – activating potential within our centres, deepening partnerships, and empowering our people to deliver at their best.
Our centres are more than places where people shop. They are places where life happens. And as we continue to elevate essentials and invest with purpose, we remain focused on creating value for our customers, communities and investors, today and over the long term.
As we look to this next chapter, I would like to acknowledge and thank Anthony Mellowes, our inaugural CEO, for guiding Region through its formative years and helping shape the strong foundation we build on today. I look forward to working alongside Greg Chubb, who joined us as CEO in early March, as he leads Region into its next phase of growth, bringing his experience and perspective to further strengthen our platform and sharpen our strategic focus.
- This article by Erica Rees, Chief Operating Officer, Region Group was first published in SCN magazine – Big Guns 2026 edition
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