Amazon has seen a huge growth of its warehousing space in the UK during 2017, expanding almost four million square feet - which is almost the size of Vatican City. The expansion dwarfed the competition this year with Lidl expanding its warehouse space by just 754,000 square feet. The news isn’t unexpected because more people are turning to online shopping and seeking out cheaper prices which Amazon offers.
According to The Telegraph, the expansion accounted for 20% of the entire new warehousing stock so far in 2017 - the total warehousing space in the country increased by a huge 19.7 million square feet. As we head into Christmas, there’s little doubt that Amazon will see its best year yet in terms of sales in the UK as more people sign up.
Kevin Mofid, the director of research at Savills, said:
“You had a point about ten years ago when the grocers - Tesco, Sainsbury’s and so on - were very active, and they took a lot of space, but it was nowhere near this level.”
Amazon has moved into the food market in the US but hasn’t made a similar move in the UK just yet. Mofid said that if the company does move into other retail areas, such as food, it could accelerate its warehouse expansions.
Source: The Telegraph | Image via P2 Photography
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