Driving excellence in retail supports economic resilience – the call for entries for the annual V&A Waterfront Neighbourhood Awards is now open
Having generated over R10 billion in sales in 2024 and coming off the back of the best December on record, with a 24% increase in international customer sales, the V&A Waterfront is still riding a retail high halfway through the year, with strong indicators in place for a successful 2025.
‘Cape Town is currently outperforming in the context of the rest of the country,’ says Alex Kabalin, retail executive at the V&A Waterfront, ‘and the Waterfront outperforms other retail destinations within the context of Cape Town itself, thanks to strong local support and international visitors who travel at all times of the year.’
As one of the leading retail environments on the continent, and one of the world’s most dynamic waterfront neighbourhoods, the V&A Waterfront and its tenants not only keep abreast of change but drive positive shifts in the market, including increased emphasis on innovation and sustainability. As a result, they display remarkable buoyancy in a retail landscape where the Consumer Confidence Index (which measures how South Africans feel about spending and saving) plunged to the lowest it’s been in years in the first quarter of 2025, and the uptake of AI tools and a growing customer-driven desire for omnichannel retail mean that the retail landscape is changing faster than Springbok winger Cheslin Kolbe.
To stay ahead of the curve, and to motivate and reward its tenant mix – which constitutes leading local and international brands, as well as emerging, small and medium-sized businesses – the V&A Waterfront holds its annual V&A Waterfront Neighbourhood Awards. This programme is now in its second year, having replaced the previous tenant awards that focused solely on customer service, a change that was ‘remarkably well received by tenants’, says Kabalin. The new awards programme not only creates resilience within the waterfront property itself, but drives the national conversation around how to bolster the economy.
The awards aim to recognise and reward tenants who demonstrate exceptional quality, creativity, customer service and contribution to the overall visitor experience at the V&A Waterfront. All retail and food & beverage tenants who are part of the V&A Waterfront can enter the awards across all categories for which they qualify. ‘We’re shining a spotlight on remarkable individuals and businesses in our neighbourhood who embody resilience, innovation and an unwavering dedication to the extraordinary,’ says Kabalin.
The 2025 award categories highlight unique talents and contributions, as follows:
Sustainability & Impact Award, honouring excellence in sustainability, social impact and empowerment.
Brand & Store Experience Award, recognising stand-outs in marketing, activations, renovations, fit-outs and visual merchandising.
Service Excellence Award, celebrating extraordinary customer service in retail, small business and food service.
Store Talent Award, acknowledging the frontline teams that bring extraordinary to the floor each and every day.
Neighbourhood Champion Award, honouring neighbourliness and ambassadorship in the V&A Waterfront world.
People's Choice Award, chosen by the general public, who vote in two rounds, to identify the winning store and eatery.
Special Recognition, awarding retail champions and long-lasting tenants.
Retail Excellence Award, decided by composite calculation which consolidates all traditional retail performance metrics and levels the playing field for tenants of all sizes.
Our new ambition is to expand on previous success and drive even more entries, with an increase in the quality of entries across the various categories,’ Kabalin says. ‘To achieve this, we’ve streamlined the 2025 entry process to make the user experience easier, and we’re calling on all of our tenants to step into the spotlight.
