Over the past weeks we have been working on new ways to analyze foot traffic, in order to help our clients understand how patterns of movement are changing, and what this means for businesses. As part of our COVID-19 package we have developed over 200 indices for multiple sectors and industries including restaurants, grocery stores, electronics, cloth-ing/accessories. These sectors can be segmented by US state as a way to visualize the response to COVID19 by using foot traffic as a proxy for social distancing.

Average daily traffic to Amazon warehouses spiked dramatically in March as the retailer ramped up its staff. Average daily traffic in March was up 43% compared to year earlier, far outstripping seasonal staffing increases. In the first few days of April the number of Amazon employees seen at their warehouses has continued to grow, as demand for home delivery surges, with increasing numbers of people following strict orders from local authorities to stay home.

As we continue our trip across the property types analyzing the change in foot traffic using Advan data and the impact of Covid-19 on commercial real estate, Eigen 10 advisors examines the industrial property sector this week. The data this week comes from the Port of LA and an industrial warehouse park outside of Chicago. The industrial park is a mix of food distribution, light manufacturing, auto part distribution and other uses.

Last week using data from Advan we showed the impact of Covid-19 on retail real estate. Our analysis this week looks at the impact of the virus on office real estate. Using data from Advan that tracks anonymized cell phone movement over time, Eigen10 Advisors examined the change in foot traffic for a New York City office building. The building’s vacancy rate did not change significantly between first quarter 2019 and 2020, from low single digits to mid-single digits.

The coronavirus pandemic that is reverberating across the country and the globe has impacted commercial real estate in ways unforeseen from previous “black swan” events. This impact has not been even across sectors or markets or even subsectors within a property type. Fortunately, with today’s technology and analytics we are able assess some of the impact as it is happening rather than waiting in arrears for the data. Using data from Advan that tracks anonymized cell phone movement over time, Eigen10 Advisors examined the change in foot traffic at a sample of different types of retail centers in different markets.

In New York City, the MTA has stated that it’s seen “ridership tick down a bit in the last week or so.” For anyone who lives there, it probably feels like more than a bit of a tick down, with subway platforms empty at rush hour and the usually bustling Grand Central terminal eerily quiet. In order to visualize what is happening at one of the busiest train terminals in the world, we looked at year-over-year foot traffic numbers at Grand Central to see just how much visitors numbers have fallen in the past few weeks.

The New York auto show, due to take place in April at the Jacob Javits Center, has been postponed until late August. Is this just a temporary setback for the Javits center - one that is likely to be seen across all convention centers, as the appetite for large gatherings dwindles with the spread of COVID-19? Or is it a sign of a longer term hit to the convention industry as a whole?

Recent news reports have highlighted an increase in foot traffic for CostCo as the spread of the coronavirus spurs people to stock up on essentials. Some analysis has put the number of visitors to CotsCo stores in the US up 72% year-over-year. At Advan, we ran a detailed analysis of true foot traffic at CostCo. The graph below shows average daily traffic for each month since October 2015, with year-over-year changes overlaid.

Has travel been affected by the coronavirus, and if so by how much and where? The overall volume of passengers traveling by air affects many of disparate industries - not just airlines but travel sites and aggregators that sell tickets, hotels and car rental companies that rely on airports for a large volume of their business, credit card companies, restaurants and retailers. The list can go on. To try and gauge the impact that a reduction in travel due to the coronavirus might be having on these sectors and more, we analyzed foot traffic in key US and international airports.

Each company trades based on different metrics, but it is fair to say that most consumer discretionary companies, especially those with a growing footprint, are judged by their comparable store sales. This is defined differently by each company, as it is not a standardized GAAP metric, but it typically means “we only measure the performance of stores that have been open for a certain amount of time”, usually anywhere from 3 to 13 months, depending on the company.