Positive Signs for City of Melton Businesses
We recently reported on a range of new retail, commercial and industrial developments that are set to increase economic output and provide jobs for local residents.
In addition to these developments there are also plenty of residential development occurring along with a number of infrastructure and capital projects underway that benefit our local economy.
While many of these projects are still in the delivery phase, they are already supporting existing businesses via supply chain effects and increased local consumption.
Regular readers of our eNewsletter and followers of the Venture Melton Facebook page will be aware that consumer and business spending, according to Spendmapp by Geografia, has been strong over recent months with a noticeably stronger upwards trend than the national spending average as illustrated below.
Source: Compiled with Spendmapp by Geografia data.
If you are not familiar with the City of Melton Spendmapp reports and you would like to know more about this data, please contact our team.
Spendmapp data may be relevant to your future expansion plans and investment decisions, or it could give you insights into where and how to allocate your advertising budget spend by looking at spending patterns at a suburb level, including customer spending from outside our municipality.
You can download the six most recent reports in pdf format from the Melton City Council website for a high-level monthly overview.
One of the factors behind the City of Melton’s strong spending performance over recent months is Victoria’s sustained high population growth, and the fact that a high proportion of this growth is occurring in our city’s residential growth areas.
With a population that is estimated to reach 440,000 by 2051, existing businesses and future investors can be confident that, with the right service or product offering, they will be well-placed to benefit from this rapidly growing customer base.
The chart below illustrates the estimated residential population growth in our city based on data provided by .id (informed decisions).
Source: Population and household forecasts, 2021 to 2051, prepared by .id (informed decisions), June 2023.
You can find out more about our population growth on the City of Melton .id pages.
Visitor spending continues to grow
A trend that has been noticeable since June 2023, and that has since been consistent in each monthly Spendmapp report, is Visitor Local Spend growth (measured year-on-year) outpacing the growth rates of all other spending categories, including resident escape spending.
This shift in momentum between escape spend growth and visitor spend growth is encouraging.
It is important to note that resident escape spend still constitutes the highest proportion of the local resident wallet share at 40.6% for the quarter and will likely change at a gradual rate, in line with local job creation and improvements to employment self-containment. While the City of Melton’s jobs to worker ration has significantly improved between the last two census cycles, there is still high economic leakage due to the “commuter effect” and associated, external spending by local residents that leave our city for work on a daily basis.
Industries that are driving this increase in Visitor Local Spend are not just local hospitality providers. Light industry, professional services and personal services businesses who export or sell their goods, services and skills to buyers from outside of our city are also contributing to this trend.
In the first quarter of the 23-24 financial year, all these sectors have been showing year-on-year (YoY) increases that are not just higher than those in other sectors but also well above the growth rate of the visiting population pool and inflation.
Visitor Local Spend, City of Melton (FY 23-24 totals and Q1 YoY comparison). Source: Compiled with Spendmapp by Geografia data.
This embodies the surge in skills, innovation and entrepreneurship found in the City of Melton business community, which is providing local residents with an ever-increasing range of quality products and services. At the same time these businesses also create a compelling value proposition for external business and consumers who increasingly choose to spend with City of Melton vendors.
We will continue to monitor this development and in the meantime, we invite you to meet some of the new entrepreneurs in the City of Melton and some of the amazing hospitality providers that are making a name for themselves in our city and beyond.
What about online spending?
Online spending is continuing to be relatively flat and has dipped from August. Overall, online spending continues to be at a high level (~32% of resident wallet share) as the pandemic accelerated and ongoing shift to online marketplaces has been firmly adopted by consumers.
Source: Spendmapp by Geografia
If you are interested in developing online sales channels, or would like to improve your current online strategy, we recommend the introductory webinar accessible via the link below. A free, self-paced course on advanced online strategies is also available on the Business Victoria website.
From bricks and mortar to online | Business Victoria
Advanced strategies for taking your business online | Business Victoria
For an introduction to a local specialist that can support you with your digital and online journey, please contact the Venture Melton team.