Less demand for warehouses in 2022

For warehouses of more than 10.000 square meters, it fell by 8% in 2022 compared to 2021, from 3,68 to 3,38 million square meters.

Logistics warehouses have been developing rapidly on French territory for several years, especially around major highways, due to the boom in e-commerce and the pressure of "zero stock".

In 2022, the erosion of demand was especially marked outside the Paris region, where it fell by 14,6%.

In Ile-de-France, the decline was 10,3%, weighted by warehouses of 5.000 to 10.000 square meters (-36,4%), a category which is not counted in the rest of the country. For warehouses of more than 10.000 square meters alone, demand on the contrary increased by 13,9%.

“Volumes in 2022 remain particularly solid,” commented René Jeannetot, director of the logistics division of BNP Paribas Real Estate, in a note.

"Even if the upcoming delivery of warehouses under construction should make it possible to temporarily streamline certain markets, the ongoing transformation of the supply chain (supply chain, editor's note), observed among players in commerce and industry, will support the good level of demand currently observed on this market", he says.

"Major logistics providers and large food retailers continued to take positions in France throughout the year, remaining the main support for the market. E-commerce specialists, for their part, show a sharp decline in 2022, a reflection of cyclical logistics overcapacity,” say CBRE analysts.

"The policy of sobriety land and the macroeconomic situation limit the potential for development. These tensions on the offer direct considerably upwards the rental values ​​on the most strained sectors", they add.

The gradual implementation of the "zero net artificialisation" rule, which aims to limit the nibbling of natural spaces by the city to protect the environment, threatens the construction of new warehouses, which are very land intensive.

Their installation is also confronted, in certain territories, with the opposition of local residents who fear in particular the increase in truck traffic.