How to find retail space that fits your concept

Say your analysis has flagged Glasgow as your next expansion opportunity. The next problem is how to find retail space there that's on the market today and suits what you sell.

You could wait for agents to email whatever they have on their books. You could call a dozen brokers, or spend a week scrolling Rightmove. Or you could ask Gini by MyTraffic: "What's the best available location for an Erewhon-like concept in Glasgow?".

That last option is BRAND new: Location Finder, now live in Gini, handles the step after you've picked a city. The screenshots below follow the Glasgow search, and the demo video runs the same flow for a coffee shop in Marseille, from the first question to the ad itself.

Why is finding retail space so slow once you've picked a city?

Choosing the area is where most location work stops. In Gini, that's the job of Expansion Planner, which ranks the zones of a city for your concept. Picking a shop to rent inside those zones is still manual work, and because no listing says whether a unit suits your business, each one needs a visit before you know if it was worth the trip.

Arthur Spriet, Solution Engineer at MyTraffic, built Location Finder to close that gap:

"What's available to rent there, right now? And which of these units is right for my business? That's the question that really decides an opening, and it's the one Location Finder answers. A coffee shop or a franchisee doesn't pick an address on a map. They sign the lease on a unit that's actually on the market. Expansion Planner tells you which neighbourhoods to open in. Location Finder is the missing piece: it finds the premises actually available in those neighbourhoods.

Before, you had to comb through listings portal by portal, weed out the offices, the warehouses and the units that don't fit your format, then guess which ones were worth a visit. Location Finder does that sorting for you. It reads live listings in France, Spain, Italy, Germany and the UK, keeps only the premises that fit your concept, and ranks them on the criteria that matter for your business. Every unit gets a score out of 10. You know which ones to visit before you've booked a single viewing."
- Arthur Spriet

Thank you Arthur for developping this!

How do you find the best available leases for your concept?

Ask Gini for the best available premises for your concept in a city, for example "What's the best available location for an Erewhon-like concept in Glasgow?" Location Finder searches the live commercial listings, keeps the units that match your filters and picks the 3 to 5 success factors that drive your type of business. Every unit gets a score from 0 to 10, and the top 3 come with a written explanation.

Where does Location Finder find retail space?

Location Finder reads listings from one major property portal per market: SeLoger in France, Fotocasa in Spain, Immobiliare in Italy, Immowelt in Germany and Rightmove in the UK. For Glasgow, that means Rightmove. Every listing appears on a map, right in the conversation.

What comes next depends on what you ask. A plain search, such as "commercial premises to rent in Glasgow", lists the 15 cheapest units in a table with the address, floor area, price and a link to the ad. Ask for a ranking, as in the Glasgow question, and every unit gets a score instead.

The search works for buying as well as renting, and in any language, so a French expansion team can type "Locaux commerciaux à louer à Marseille" and run the same search. In France, it also covers fonds de commerce, where you buy an existing business, including its lease rights and customer base.

Which filters shape a search for retail space for lease?

Three filters shape the shortlist, and people often forget to set them. Budget becomes a price cap on the search and never counts towards a unit's score, so the ranking stays about business fit and a unit can't climb just by being cheap. Floor area follows your concept: Gini proposes size bands that fit what you're opening, so a bakery gets different bands from a supermarket, and you can tick several.

The third filter is a set of extra criteria, offered after every search and different in each country. In France, these are parking, terrace, shopfront, storage, air conditioning and accessibility. In Spain, they're air conditioning and a smoke vent, which any kitchen needs. You can add them in plain text, such as "with a terrace and PMR (step-free) access", and Gini re-runs the search.

How does Gini score each unit?

Gini starts by researching the concept, in this case a premium organic grocery with a smoothie bar. It then chooses the factors that drive that kind of business from footfall, catchment population, competition and local spending. For a premium grocery, local spending is an obvious candidate.

The screenshot below shows the factors Gini picked for Glasgow, each unit's score out of 10 and the reasoning behind the top 3, so you can see why each unit ranks where it does.

Visit the top 3 first, and take the explanations with you as a checklist. If a unit scored well on footfall, check the footfall at the door at lunchtime and in the evening. Then evaluate each one fully before you sign.

From best zone to best unit: Location Finder inside Expansion Planner

This is the handover the video shows: Location Finder picks up where Expansion Planner stops.

Ask "Where should I open a coffee shop in Marseille?" and Expansion Planner ranks the zones. One click on "available premises in the best zones" sends Location Finder into the listings for those zones. It inherits the success factors and weights Expansion Planner already used, so zones and units are judged on the same basis. Gini then ranks the units on the zone heatmap and opens the full ranking in a dashboard, without asking you anything twice.

The whole path runs in one conversation: a coffee shop idea, a ranked list of Marseille zones, a scored list of units, then the SeLoger listing for the one you want to visit.

Frequently asked questions

How current are the listings?

Location Finder reads live listings, so the units it shows are the ones on the portal when you run the search. If a few days pass before your viewings, run it again to catch new units and drop any that have gone.

Which cities can I search?

Any city in France, Spain, Italy, Germany or the UK with commercial premises listed on SeLoger, Fotocasa, Immobiliare, Immowelt or Rightmove. Results depend on what's on the market there that day.

How to find retail space after you pick a city

For Glasgow, the answer now takes one question. Location Finder tells you which units on the market today fit your concept, and the order to visit them in.

Try Gini for free and ask for the best available premises for your concept in your next city.