csedwards72

Triangle Town Center has sales of $329 per sf and is 87% occupied. Those sales figures are below the national average for malls. UBS is doing a financing of the mall as it's being sold by the current owner.

In Charlotte, (i) traffic is worse, (ii) business leaders have really pushed for it (the big banks' heads have a lot of influence, and one of them is very pro-downtown development/mass transit, and (iii) there aren't as many anti-tax/pro-libertarian advocates in Charlotte as in G'ville.

How is Crabtree faring vs. Triangle Town Center and the Streets at Southpoint? Over the long term, I don't see TTC and SatS keeping some upscale tenants and anchors along with mid-market ones; generally it seems as if one mall ends up being the upscale mall and the others lose upscale tenants. And if Crabtree loses two anchors, wouldn't it be negatively impacted? Then again, when SouthPark in Charlotte lost its Sears, it didn't seem to affect the mall at all; actually, the mall is probably faring better now since it's even more exclusive than before.

Southwest isn't coming to GSP anytime soon. Southwest flies only B737s, which need more passengers to be profitable than GSP can provide; it seems like most flights from GSP are regional jets. I'd keep an eye on Jet Blue, which is taking delivery of regional jets sometime in the near future and which has been eyeing IAD as a focus city, especially as FlyI is possibly on its last legs. GSP-IAD flights on Jet Blue seem like a decent possibility.

Does anyone have any sales figures for other Charlotte malls? Has Northlake impacted SouthPark and Carolina Place, in particular?

The Eastland info posted above is accurate; I checked the latest 10-K from glimcher.com: Sales per square foot: $233 In-line tenant occupancy: 91% Lease expirations: Ice House 7/31/05 Belk- owns land and operates under an operating agreement Sears- same Dillard's- same Cameron Group (?)- building owned by third party

Those figures are really bad. I think the average mall in the US does somewhat over $300 per square foot. I'm surprised as well because (i) the vacancy rate at Eastland doesn't seem too bad and (ii) there are plenty of shoppers there. I'd guess that having many shoppers who don't spend much and stores that don't charge much results in this.

From the Eastland Mall website: New stores at Eastland: Can Fix It - alterations while you wait…located on the lower level inside entrance B. Cultural Designs – air brushing…located on the lower level outside Dillards Sanchez Mexican Food – located in the food court across from Sbarro’s. Stores coming soon: Downtown Locker Room Fame Athlete’s Foot Asmara Cuisine – East African food AVON – your favorite Avon products The Braidery – specializing in children’s hair. Assuming these new tenants were told of any departing anchors, why would they (especially Athlete's Foot, a national chain) sign leases now? Admittedly, tenants apart from the Athlete's Foot are signs of a dying mall.

Belk is doing well financially, and it just bought Saks' mid-market Southern department store chains, so it'd be a big company to swallow. What would the point be if Federated bought it, other than to eliminate a competitor, as now most every mall with a Belk's, except the ones in small towns, will also have a Federated store already as a co-anchor?

Re: Bloomingdale's, the latest Federated press release (available at http://www.federated-fds.com) doesn't mention one coming to SouthPark, although it mentions a few coming to California.

I moved from Spanish Harlem in Manhattan to Charlotte, so I'm a NY transplant as well, in a way. Do an archive search on charlotte.com or charlotte.bizjournals.com and some interesting stories come up, showing why Eastland gets such a bad rap.

I agree with the Eastland area's prospects but why tear the mall down? Apart from that pitiful sun logo above the entrances and the '70s-looking Sears sign on top, the mall doesn't need much updating; the interior seems decent, although it is starting to look tired. There is one mall on North Tryon- Northpark Mall- that appears to be vintage '70s but still seems to do OK, with some lower-priced stores filling most of its spaces. I see Eastland becoming a larger version of that mall: not particularly nice, but doing a decent amount of business.

I drove by Eastland yesterday and there were plenty of cars in the parking lot- at least around the Dillard's. That mall still seems to do a decent business. Anyone have any numbers for its performance after Northlake's opening?

Is this the same "City Tavern" that has a few locations in Charlotte? It's a good place; moderately upscale.

I went to Northlake yesterday for a quick errand at Belk's and the mall appeared to be thriving, at least based on the packed parking lot. Anyone have sales figures or insights on its performance? Thanks.

Greenville Mall also had a Dillard's clearance center on the second floor of the store. It was a sad sight. At least Eastland might avoid having one of those if the store is just closed rather than allowed to linger on. The main floor of the Greenville Mall store and the whole McAlister store seemed well-stocked, though.

Great point! There are many acres of vacant or underdeveloped land around downtown Greenville and especially near downtown's southwest. Why not take this land and redevelop it? Replacing run-down buildings and parking lots with nice new office buildings would be great and, in my view, far better than (1) leaving acres of run-down buildings and parking lots near downtown and (2) replacing nice green space near I-85 with nice new office buildings. Perhaps the areas near downtown are somewhat dodgy, but so was the West End before it was redeveloped starting in the 1990s.

The Dillard's at Greenville Mall and McAlister Square in Greenville, SC both closed; the McAlister Square one closed in 1995 and the Greenville Mall closed recently- perhaps 2003. Both stores seemed well-stocked until the bitter end. Both malls died afterwards.

You make some really good points. Development visible to people along I-85 may well attract development throughout Greenville. I hope that it will. In Charlotte, look at South Tryon Street, near Wachovia's HQ, and North Tryon Street, near Bank of America's HQ. Wachovia built a large part of its office space in University City rather than uptown. Bank of America focused its office development uptown. As a result, South Tryon Street is surrounded by some office buildings but a lot of parking lots. North Tryon Street is surrounded by nice office buildings, restaurants, museums, etc. and is relatively more vibrant. If Wachovia had focused its construction uptown, uptown Charlotte would be a lot larger and would have many more restaurants, stores, etc. I see the parking lots between Main and Church Streets in Greenville and just imagine how many nice things could be built on them rather than in the suburbs. I just see that the development of Haywood Road in the 1980s killed downtown retail for 15 years; if city planners had aimed to keep retail downtown rather than allowing places like Congaree and Haywood Roads to spring up, I think Greenville would have been a nicer place. Similarly, I'd prefer to have office space built downtown, as restaurants and stores spring up to serve office workers, creating a more vibrant area. Getting even a Border's bookstore and things like that downtown would be much easier if the CBD had a lot more office space. Greenville's suburban office market isn't exactly thriving anyhow; if I were a developer, I wouldn't build more space in a submarket with a 27.5% vacancy rate: http://www.southeastrebusiness.com/article.../snapshot1.html

Good point but what about people who visit only Greenville's downtown? Currently it has about 50% of the county's office space, which is pretty good. Let's say that over the next ten years, Greenville attracts five million square feet of office space. If all of it goes downtown, downtown's office space would just about double, and there would also be restaurants, stores, etc. that spring up to accompany that. If only 50% or 25% of that new office space goes downtown, downtown will expand at a much slower rate. People who visit downtown might not realize how large Greenville's white-collar employment base is if only a small fraction of office space is built downtown. As a former NYC resident, seeing the BB&T building's 20-some stories as the tallest building in town makes me think that Greenville is a nice town but just a smallish town. A nice 30-story office building towntown would help change that image, but we need development shifted downtown to have something like that occur. I just think that we'd have a much nicer center if civic leaders would try to shift development downtown. Look how much nicer our center is after a few entertainment venues and some new office buildings were built downtown; nice stores and restaurants followed, creating a nice area. Downtown will be so much better if even more is built there in the future rather than allowing development to sprawl all around town.

I don't see how these office parks will ever materialize as promised, and I hope they don't. Greenville's suburban office space is already way overbuilt, and there is a high vacancy rate. The only area for office space that is doing well in Greenville is downtown. Anyhow, if these office parks do materialize, they will significantly hinder downtown development. Imagine how many new stores and restaurants would spring up downtown if all of this new office space went there instead of in the suburbs.

I ought to rephrase what I wrote- Haywood Mall is the "only remaining enclosed mall in Greenville not featured on deadmalls.com".

Sounds like Greenville's only remaining mall will be like Northlake Mall that just opened in Charlotte- lots of various shades of brown decor, leather furniture, mid-market anchors and a range of price points among the in-line tenants, with a few upscale ones but mostly mid-market ones.

Good question- although Charlotte has a convenience-store sized Belk's uptown that sells a few things (but not clothes)- and why hasn't Parisian opened small department stores in larger Southern cities to target office workers, given that the Parisian in downtown Birmingham seems to do well?