Rachel Bradburn, head of leasing at Redical, owner and operator of Victoria Leeds shopping centre, shares why the Yorkshire city has become many premium brands' UK debut outside of London.
There is a question I am asked with increasing regularity by brands considering their UK expansion beyond London: why Leeds? My answer is always the same – the better question is why not Leeds, and why not sooner?
For too long, the city has been treated as a secondary consideration, a market to reach once a brand has exhausted the obvious metropolitan choices. That thinking has changed, and data provided by CACI, as well as luxury brands such as Louis Vuitton, Vivienne Westwood and Mulberry arriving at Victoria Leeds, tell the story more clearly than any anecdote.
Leeds sits fourth – after London's West End, Glasgow and Manchester – among all UK city centres outside London when ranked by available consumer spending potential. It is the dominant retail destination within Yorkshire and the Humber by a considerable margin; something that has been helped by finance and law firms taking office space in the city in recent years, providing retail brands with more opportunity to attract an affluent shopper profile. But raw catchment size only tells part of the story. What distinguishes Leeds is the quality of the demand, not just its scale.
According to [research company] CACI's Shopper Dimensions benchmarking [which draws on real transactional data] for 2025, Leeds shoppers spend more per transaction, more per visit and deliver a higher overall customer value than the UK city centre average. These are not aspirational figures. They are what retailers are actually seeing at the till.
That affluence has a structural basis. The Leeds catchment skews more affluent than much of the North and Midlands, and that net disposable income translates directly into retail behaviour. For brands whose customer base travels, Leeds captures that spend in a way that more locally-dependent markets simply cannot.
On the premium and luxury spectrum [demonstrated with the percentage of brands that are premium and luxury, as defined by CACI], Leeds ranks second only to London among UK city centres. That positioning matters enormously when a brand is deciding where to plant its flag outside the capital. It means the competitive set is right, the customer expectations are right and critically, the risk profile of a debut location is far lower than conventional wisdom about northern retail might suggest. Furthermore, no other regional city has its aspirational and luxury brands clustered in a compact area in the same way that Leeds does, making it a truly unique proposition when it comes to the strength of its brand mix.
Over the last 18 months, Wax London, Byredo and APM Monaco have each chosen Leeds as their first UK location outside London. That is not a coincidence; it reflects a considered decision by brand teams who have done the analysis and concluded that the city's luxury credentials are genuine. Finisterre, Aesop and Arabian Oud have made their northern debuts here, while Alo and AS Colour opened their first Yorkshire stores at Victoria Leeds. These are not brands chasing footfall at any cost. They are brands with a clear sense of where their customers are and where the opportunity is real.
What strikes me in conversations with leasing teams and brand directors is how often the data surprises them. The assumption that luxury retail belongs exclusively in London, or that northern consumers represent a different, lesser kind of opportunity, persists longer than it should. The data dismantles that assumption methodically. Leeds is not punching above its weight. It is, increasingly, being valued at its actual weight and said brand directors are taking notice.
The brands arriving in Leeds are not pioneering into unknown territory. They are following evidence. Leeds has one of the most compelling combinations of catchment depth, shopper quality, tourist contribution and premium positioning in the country. The question for brands still waiting is not whether Leeds is ready for them, it is whether they are ready to stop waiting.
‘As published by Drapers on 23 July 26’
