How to reconnect customers to food retailing

A bee highway, cooking arena and Australia’s first organic waste stream for customers are just three of the ways The Kitchens at Robina Town Centre has redefined the food precinct.

Robina Town Centre recently took out the 2017 Retail Property of the Year award, as well as excellence awards for food retailing and marketing for The Kitchens.

The Property Council of Australia’s Queensland Retail Property of the Year Awards acknowledge the best in retail properties and precincts and celebrate the contribution of the industry to the broader community. The winners were announced at a gala dinner at Brisbane City Hall on 1 September.

Queensland executive director of the Property Council, Chris Mountford, says Robina Town Centre is a fitting winner of the Retail Property of the Year title.

“The judges felt that The Kitchens really pushes the boundaries and blurs the lines of both casual dining and food retailing, redefining the way we traditionally view food precincts,” he says.

“The Kitchens provides the Gold Coast with an urban marketplace, delivering a multi-sensory, fresh food and dining experience.”

The Kitchens encourages customers to embark on a culinary journey of discovery. The separation between back and front of house has been removed, connecting customers with the food creation process.

The butcher makes sausages as shoppers watch on, the baker pulls fresh bread from the ovens, the smell of coffee beans roasting hangs in the air, the teppanyaki plates sizzle while the dumplings are assembled by hand.

A dedicated stage hosts regular cooking demonstrations by a resident chef, head chefs from within The Kitchens, as well as celebrity chefs. The ingredients for the cooking workshops are sourced from within the centre.

An urban ‘bee highway’ connecting 36 field hives located on QIC’s adjacent land produces 375 kilograms of honey per harvest, which is then used as part of the retailers’ offering and is also sold directly to the customers. An estimated one million bees have been introduced into the local community as a result of this project alone.

The first food precinct in Australia to include an organic waste stream for customers, The Kitchens works with OzHarvest to rescue quality excess food that would otherwise end in landfill.

“The unique retailing environment created is of the highest standard of excellence, and highly deserving of the Retail Property of the Year title. Congratulations to the team at Robina Town Centre and QIC for their outstanding achievement,” Mountford adds.

Read more about The Kitchens and the power of curating places for people in our back issue of Property Australia.