Shopping boom in city centre.

20 Nov, 2005

Shops in Copenhagen city centre have registered a 15 percent increase in turnover in the first nine months of this year over the same period last year, to a total of almost Dkk8 billion, against an overall growth in the retail trade of 6.2 percent. The boom comes in spite of fears that last years opening of the Fields shopping centre on the outskirts of the city would draw customers away from downtown shops and stores. Fields is reportedly the biggest shopping centre in Scandinavia and attracts shoppers from all over Denmark as well as Sweden. However, some of this influx seems to have had an overflow effect on the city centre. The chairman of the local trade council, Thomas Fokdal, also cites the renovation of two major department stores, Magasin du Nord and Illum, as contributing to the increase in city centre retail turnover.