Estonia, EU – Baltic States, Markets and Companies, Retail

"With the addition of new stores, the retail mix was revitalized to provide shoppers with a more interesting and complete shopping experience and turn Rocca al Mare into a truly customer service oriented life style centre that caters to all demographics", states the jury.

Rocca al Mare is the first Estonian shopping center to be nominated for this international award. Nominations and awards have been traditionally dominated by West European shopping centers with East Europe just starting to make its mark in  the past couple of years. This year saw the first nominations from Estonia, Russia, Croatia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

”We are deeply honored and extremely excited to qualify in the finals. The nomination is a great recognition of challenging but successful development project not only for the whole development team but also for Citycon,” states Property Investment Manager Pekka Huttunen from Citycon.

“The nomination for the award is a seal of approval that we’re moving in the right direction – we are a market leader in Estonia and in the same class with global leaders. Rocca al Mare shopping center continues to invests to create the best mix of interior design and choice of retail shops, restaurants and services,” said BC Mati Pops, General Manager of Rocca al Mare shopping center.

Rocca al Mare shopping center underwent a large-scale expansion that added 25,000 square meters to the center in 2009. It became the first shopping center in the Baltic Region to be awarded a LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certificate for environmental sustainability.

Members of the jury will visit all nominees in March and April next year and the European Shopping Center Awards will be announced in June 2011 at the awards ceremony in Paris.

Acknowledged as the most prestigious award within the industry International Council of Shopping Centers has presented the European Shopping Center Award since 1977. More information: http://www.icsc.org/europeanawards/

Rocca al Mare Shopping Centre

After more than 10 years of its activity, Rocca al Mare shopping centre started the renovation  and expansion process in the beginning of 2007. The 3-phase renewing was finished in the end of November 2009. The new Rocca al Mare shopping centre targets to be the starting point of shopping for the inhabitants as well as for guests of Tallinn. Rocca al Mare Shopping Centre is the biggest shopping centre in Estonia with more than 160 different stores. Due to many flagship stores of recognized brands, comfortable theme zones, restaurants and extra conveniences, the guests of the centre will get the best shopping experience. Also, Rocca al Mare shopping centre aims to be an essential part of the biggest and the most diverse free time area in Tallinn, by contributing to local cooperation projects and to the development of the region. www.roccaalmare.ee