Shopping Center Business is the leading monthly business magazine for the retail real estate industry.
Issue link: http://shoppingcenterbusiness.epubxp.com/i/752067
NEWMARK MERRILL 108 • SHOPPING CENTER BUSINESS • December 2016 Woodland Hills, California-based compa- ny, led by CEO Sandy Sigal, manages or owns approximately 70 shopping centers in California, Colorado and Illinois. The company operates approximately 1.5 mil- lion square feet of retail in Colorado. In addition to Village at the Peaks, it owns the 105,064-square-foot Broomfield Pla- za in Broomfield; the 164,611-square foot Arvada Marketplace in Arvada; the 79,071-square foot Fort Collins Mar- ketplace in Fort Collins; and manages 488,494 square feet at Citadel Crossing in Colorado Springs and 100,000-square- foot Fox Creek in Longmont. NewMark Merrill Companies' mot- to — "When you love shopping centers, it shows" — is a guiding principle that is carefully enacted on the ground, every day. "We're really in the business of cre- ating value in our centers," Ginsborg says. "We don't just collect the rent and make sure the bushes are cut. Whether we own them or manage them third-party, we love them all the same. "Our approach is intensive, whether it's incrementally or rapidly, we improve our tenant mix and the physical aspects of the shopping center to make it more function- al and attractive, as well as culturally con- temporary, especially in terms of social media. And we are always asking, what can we do to increase sales for our mer- chants, and what are we going to do to increase value for the investors? We position the shopping center to be viable for the long term. We don't just put a Band-Aid on it." As an acquisition, re- development and man- agement project, The Village at the Peaks is a feather in the cap of the Mountain States of- fice that embodies this ethos. NewMark Merrill purchased the mall, built in 1985, from Panattoni Develop- ment Co., who ac- quired it in 2007 for $33.6 million, accord- ing to local media re- ports. In 2010, New- Mark Merrill began managing the mall, which went into fore- closure in 2011 and was at 50 percent occu- pancy when NewMark moved to purchase it. "To be competitive today, you have to know how to create an experience at your shopping center that draws not only cus- tomers, but community members," Gins- borg says. "If you've got a grocery anchor, you'll bring people in, but even groceries are under attack from the internet. So you've got to give people a reason to come, and then a reason to come back." Not only is having the right tenant mix that squares with the community a bare necessity, it's also about the requisite social media connections, using the cen- ter as a forum for events or classes, and encouraging social and environmental responsibility. The Village at the Peaks trade area count is 285,786. Within a five-minute drive of the center, 43 percent of house- holds have incomes higher than $100,000, with $98,355 as the average yearly income in Longmont. "I see a good market in Colorado," Ginsborg says. "It's reached a new level of stability, it has a diversified labor force and its own identity. When I first started working in Colorado in the early '90s, it was clearly what I would call a secondary market, but today, the pricing in assets is starting to creep up, and it is heading in the direction of Portland or Seattle. Since the recovery, Colorado has boomed. It's really firing on all pistons." SCB A 12-screen Regal Cinemas theater anchors the open-air center. Additional anchors include Whole Foods Market and Sam's Club.