Building cinemas, or cineplexes (cinema complexes) as they are known, inside shopping centers is a worldwide trend, and an increasing number of local retailers are jumping on the bandwagon.

Shanghai No. 1 Yaohan Co. Ltd., the operator of the Nextage Department Store in Pudong District and the country's first retailer with foreign investment, announced yesterday that a 3,000-square-meter cineplex will open on the store's 10th floor by the end of this year.

Shanghai No. 1 Yaohan signed an agreement last month with Shanghai Film Art Center, which will lease the space for eight cinema halls in the store.

The new cineplex - New Shanghai Film Art Center - is now under construction on the 10th floor of the store where some entertainment facilities, like bowling and snooker, are already open to business.

"The cinema will bring more visitors to the store, and the move is in line with our efforts to extend the store's enter-tainment scope to win customers," said Wen Yuqing of Yaohan.

Meanwhile, Super Brand Mall, invested by the Thailand-based Chia Tai Group and which claims to be the largest mall in Asia, said yesterday it is gearing up for construction of a cineplex on its eighth floor, in cooperation with the Beijing-based China Movie Group.

Though no date has been set for the opening of the cineplex, "the mall will have grand opening next month."

In fact, cineplexes have already proven to be successful at other shop-ping malls. Studio City on the 10th floor of Westgate Mall and Paradise Cinema City on the sixth floor of Grand Gateway Plaza in Xujiahui area are now the top two cinemas - each with a monthly revenue of 2 million yuan (US$240,000).

"Since the cinema opened in Feb-ruary, restaurants have found that their revenues are up almost 50 percent," said a Grand Gateway Plaza official.

( eastday.com September 18, 2002)