Business Improvement Districts (BID) perform best when they are owner driven rather than tenant driven, Matthew Bauer of the Madison Avenue Business Improvement District and Gary Reeves of the New West End Company said at Mapic, the international market for retail real estate, in Cannes.

The owner’s hand is on the tiller at the Madison Avenue's BID, the audience heard. Tenants, on the other hand, often hesitate to re-locate to a BID because they wonder why they should contribute to the appreciation of real estate in the area.

Bauer explained that the Madison Avenue BID in the Upper East Side of Manhattan is a public/private partnership that provides a wide range of services to the district. The services include supplemental security and sanitation services, capital improvements, marketing and promotional programming for the boutiques, hotels, restaurants, galleries and personal & professional services establishments.

BIDs are often set up as a response to a decline in the popularity of a retail district in the centre of a city due to competition from shop developments on the edge of the urban area. The New West End Company in London traces its origins back over ten years but was formally established as a Business Improvement District (BID) in April 2005.

The New West End Company has an initial three-year mandate 'to create a more profitable trading environment for the West End's three famous shopping Streets - Bond Street, Oxford Street and Regent Street'. The BID works to make the district cleaner and safer, while taking the lead in joint marketing initiatives and organising events to draw in more shoppers.