The Frankston Power Centre, also colloquially known as "The Power Centre" (previously the Frankston Homemaker Centre), is a hard goods retail park run by Spotlight Group within the approximate centre of Frankston, being around 40 kilometres south of Melbourne's CBD. The complex comprises 30 large format independent stores, including parking for 1300 vehicles (including 425 underground parking spaces). Across from the complex are stores such as the hardware superstore

Bunnings Bunnings Group Limited, trading as Bunnings Warehouse or Bunnings, is an Australian hardware and garden centre chain. The chain has been owned by Wesfarmers since 1994, and has stores in Australia and New Zealand. Bunnings was founded in Per ...

and

JB Hi-Fi JB Hi-Fi Limited is an Australian consumer electronics retail company. It is publicly listed on the Australian Securities Exchange. Its headquarters are located in Southbank, Melbourne, Victoria. As of June 2024, the company operates 330 sto ...

, but these are not run by the Spotlight Group. The Power Centre is located at the crossroads of three major arterials; Cranbourne Road, McMahons Road and the Frankston Freeway. The site also features a

food court A food court (in Asia-Pacific also called food hall or hawker centre) is generally an indoor plaza or common area within a facility that is contiguous with the counters of multiple food Vendor, vendors and provides a common area for self-serve di ...

at it's geographical centre with adjacent parking.

History

The area of the Frankston Power Centre was formerly a

suburban A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...

district of Frankston. Peninsula Power Management bought around 90,000 m² (963,445 sq ft) in what is the nominal geographic centre of Frankston. They developed it into what it is today at an estimated value of $60 million in 2008, finishing construction in 2009. It features 45,000 m² (481723 sq ft) of bulky goods retail facilities. The initial purchaser has an unknown whereabouts today. Today, the park is owned by the Spotlight Group, who features a store inside the centre. This ownership stems from unknown factors. Since 2016, a plan for a major revamp of the retail park circulated. The proposal would have involved a children's entertainment area, upgraded

centre, and more in the centre of the complex. The owners however, have expressed concerns on what would next occur, referring to the unpredictability of the future for the centre, and thus future construction has been halted. In 2019 another planned development was the proposal to build a supermarket at the site of Spotlight and Forty-Winks, however it has been shot down due to "negative economic impact on the ongoing viability of the supermarkets and businesses in the vicinity of the proposed development," referring to the Covid-19 crisis at the time and nearby centres such as the Towerhill developments south of such as well as the Karingal Hub and Bayside

shopping malls A shopping mall (or simply mall) is a large indoor shopping center, usually anchored by department stores. The term ''mall'' originally meant a pedestrian promenade with shops along it, but in the late 1960s, it began to be used as a generi ...

Retailers

Retailers at the Frankston Power Centre include a variety of

specialty store A specialty store is a shop/store that carries a deep assortment of brands, styles, or models within a relatively narrow category of goods. :Furniture retailers, Furniture stores, florists, sporting goods stores, and bookstores are all specialty s ...

hardware store Hardware stores (in a number of countries, "shops"), sometimes known as DIY stores, sell household hardware for home improvement including: fasteners, building materials, hand tools, power tools, keys, locks, hinges, chains, plumbing ...

s, and more. Major retailers include The Good Guys, Harvey Norman,

Freedom Freedom is the power or right to speak, act, and change as one wants without hindrance or restraint. Freedom is often associated with liberty and autonomy in the sense of "giving oneself one's own laws". In one definition, something is "free" i ...

, Spotlight and Anaconda. It also includes minor retailers including Forty Winks, Petbarn, AMart, Adairs, Harris Scarfe, Nick Scali, Carpet Call, and more. It also includes a minor food court within its centre, with minor retailers within.

Accessibility and Location

It can be accessed via car, bus and train, through certain routes. These routes include parking spaces accessible from Gertrude Street, McMahons Road in addition to Cranbourne Road. In addition to this, a

bus service Public transport bus services are generally based on regular operation of transit buses along a route calling at agreed bus stops according to a published public transport timetable. History of buses Origins While there are indications o ...

serves the location, with routes 789, 790 and 791 respectively. The Leawarra Station, situated on the Stony Point Line of the Melbourne Train Network is approximately 500 metres away from the centre. This connection to the station will become even more effective once the electrification of the line is completed. The Frankston Power Centre is located directly in the middle of Bayside Shopping Centre and Karingal Hub Shopping Centre, the two main shopping centres in the Frankston Suburb. In addition to this, the intersection the retail park is situated in features multiple fuel stations such as

7-Eleven 7-Eleven, Inc. is an American convenience store chain, headquartered in Irving, Texas. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Seven-Eleven Japan, which in turn is owned by the retail holdings company Seven & I Holdings. The chain was founde ...

and

United Petroleum United Petroleum is an Australian petrol retailer and importer. It was established in 1993 and, , has over 450 petrol stations in Australia. The company also owns Pie Face, a pie outlet it acquired in 2017 and subsequently rolled out to many of ...

as well as a Subway and Carwash.

Incidents

3 October 2019, at 6:40am, a car purposefully rammed into the Power Centres' Food Court doors, attempting to steal an ATM. It is currently unknown how much money they got away with, due to them escaping on foot. The perpetrators were likely inspired by the successful attacks on the nearby Peninsula Homemaker Centre a month prior in Mornington.

References

{{reflist Shopping centres in Victoria (state) 2009 establishments in Australia