As of 30 October 2026, Super Retail Group has opened a A$90 million retail precinct at Fountain Gate Central in Narre Warren, south-east Melbourne, placing BCF, Rebel, Supercheap Auto and Macpac side by side on the same day for the first time and marking the group's 800th store. The 14,100sqm development, built by BWP Group on a former Bunnings site, carries Victoria's first BCF Superstore and the largest Rebel experience zone in Australia, and the group says the four stores occupy around three-quarters of the site.
Why four banners beat four separate sites
A single 14,100sqm site lets four high-ticket categories share car parking, access roads and the drive time that none of them could justify alone. Outdoor gear, sporting equipment, automotive parts and hiking apparel each need a wide catchment, so co-location reaches the same households with fewer leases and a shorter development pipeline.
The layout also changes what each banner can stock. BCF's 3,500sqm superstore format and Rebel's experience zone, which includes a multi-purpose court for basketball, football and pickleball, only work when the site is large enough. In a standard mall tenancy those formats would be trimmed to a fraction of the range, which is why the same four brands cannot simply be dropped into a shopping centre.
Three measures that decide a co-located site
Drive time rather than suburb
The unit of analysis stops being the postcode and becomes the shared drive time across four categories. A household that will travel 20 minutes for fishing gear will also travel 20 minutes for running shoes, so the relevant catchment is the overlap of four separate trade areas rather than the sum of them.
Range depth over store count
Store count is a poor proxy for reach when one site carries four ranges. What matters is how many SKUs each banner can hold at that location, because depth is what pulls a customer past a closer competitor. Measuring range depth per site is a better input to store selection than counting doors in a region.
Labour and service density
Almost 70 jobs across four stores means roughly 17 people per banner, which is thin for formats that promise fitting advice, repair stations and installation help. Labour density per square metre should be checked before a format is replicated, because understaffed service formats lose the very advantage they were built to deliver.
Scoring a co-location site
| Measure | What it captures | Threshold to test |
|---|---|---|
| Shared drive time | Catchment overlap across categories | Twenty minutes or less |
| Range depth per banner | SKUs held at the site | Comparable to a superstore |
| Labour per square metre | Service capacity | Enough for peak weekends |
| Site history | Access and loading capacity | Fits a superstore format |
| Parking ratio | Whether four banners share bays | Peak Saturday demand |
A workable scorecard separates catchment, range and labour into three columns and sets a threshold for each. Sites that clear all three move to the shortlist; sites that clear only catchment are usually better served by a smaller format or by an online-only range, because the cost of a large box cannot be recovered on traffic alone.
The scorecard should also record what the site replaced. A former Bunnings box has different access, ceiling height and loading capacity from a greenfield pad, and those physical facts decide whether a superstore format fits at all, long before any catchment model is run or any rent is negotiated.
What to check before replicating
Replication is where co-location gets expensive. A four-banner precinct is a bet that the shared catchment is large enough to support four ranges at full depth. If the first site only works because of an opening promotion, the second will not repeat the result, and the leases will outlast the enthusiasm that justified them.
FAQ
Does co-location really reduce the number of stores a group needs?
It can, because four ranges share one catchment and one set of access costs, but only where each banner can still hold full range depth at the site.
Why does the 800th store matter?
It marks the point where a store pipeline becomes a portfolio question: each new site is judged against an existing network rather than on its own merits.
What is the main risk of a four-banner format?
Understaffed service formats lose their advantage, and a site that only works on opening-week traffic will not repeat the result elsewhere.
How should a retailer test a precinct?
Score catchment, range depth and labour density separately, then check what the site replaced before committing to a superstore format.
