CAMBRIDGE, MASS. — Outdoor apparel and equipment retailer REI will open an 8,000-square-foot store at Cambridge Crossing, a 43-acre mixed-use development located at the junction of Boston, Cambridge and Somerville. The opening of the store, which is scheduled for this fall, represents the launch of the retailer’s new small-format prototype and will be located within a newly constructed office and retail building. DivcoWest is the master developer of Cambridge Crossing.
SPARKS, NEV. — A joint venture between Foothill Partners and Belay Investment Group has purchased a vacant, 209,000-square-foot former Lowe’s Home Improvement Warehouse property in Sparks for an undisclosed price. The partnership plans to redevelop the site into an environmental, social and corporate governance, arts-based technology, flex and research and development campus named The Oddie District. Located at 2450 Oddie Blvd., the vacant property will be repurposed into creative office, flex-tech R&D, lab and maker spaces, as well as food and beverage tenant space and work-live studios for artists and entrepreneurs. Construction is slated to start later this year, with a planned opening date of the project’s first phase in August 2022. The partnership has already signed two tenants: The Generator and The Innovation Collective. The Generator, a nonprofit maker space that serves as a creative resource for Northern Nevada community members, will occupy 35,000 square feet of the project. The Innovative Collection, a Coeur d’Alene, Idaho-based business accelerator and collaborative co-working space for technology companies, will occupy 12,500 square feet at The Oddie District. Another 100,000 square feet of flex-tech space will be available to technology, research, engineering, software and design companies complemented by 16,000 square feet of restaurant …
TEMPE, ARIZ. — Marcus & Millichap has arranged the sale of retail property located at 1727 W. Ranch Road in Tempe. MAR Group acquired the asset from a private preferred developer of EoS Fitness for $9.6 million. EoS Fitness occupies the 38,000-square-foot property under a net-lease agreement. Mark Thiel of Marcus & Millichap represented the seller and procured the buyer. Ryan Sarbinoff of Marcus & Millichap’s Phoenix office served as broker of record.
CINCINNATI — The Kroger Co. (NYSE: KR) is holding a nationwide hiring event today across its store brands. The Cincinnati-based grocer says the goal of the event is to hire 10,000 associates supporting retail, e-commerce, pharmacy, manufacturing and logistics operations. Interviews will be conducted both virtually and in-store. Across its family of companies, Kroger employs nearly half a million associates who serve over 9 million customers daily through both digital shopping experiences and 2,800 retail food stores. Kroger’s stock price opened at $38.48 per share Thursday, June 10, up from $32.57 per share one year ago.
CHICAGO — Associated Bank has provided a $12.9 million loan for the acquisition and renovation of a shopping center and surface parking lot located at 4501 N. Sheridan Road in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood. The buyer, a joint venture between Mavrek Development and GW Properties, plans to demolish the center and build a new five-story property consisting of 59 apartment units and 7,035 square feet of retail space. Plans call for larger units than what can currently be found in the Uptown area as well as built-in workstations, in-unit laundry and private balconies. The second floor will feature an outdoor amenity space. Mavrek will also serve as general contractor. Daniel Barrins of Associated Bank handled the loan closing.
By Kristin Hiller The design and construction of cannabis dispensaries and cultivation facilities are generating lucrative business opportunities for architects and contractors as more states legalize recreational marijuana. Recreational use is now permissible in 17 states plus Washington, D.C. About 55 million, or 16.9 percent, of Americans currently use marijuana, according to the National Center for Drug Abuse Statistics. One contractor, Northbrook, Illinois-based Mosaic Construction, has created an entire division devoted to cannabis design-build services named Cannabis Facility Construction (CFC). “We continue to see the impact of the Green Rush in our pipeline,” states Andy Poticha, principal of CFC, which builds dispensaries, cultivation facilities and processing centers. “As the cannabis industry expands nationwide, it is headed toward a legal market worth $41.5 billion annually by 2025.” Cannabis accounts for approximately 65 percent of CFC’s total revenue and 47 percent of its project pipeline, according to Poticha. Virginia Maggiore, vice president of store planning for architecture firm RDC, says she has noticed an uptick in cannabis projects in the last two years, as a growing number of municipalities have begun awarding licenses or raising their number of licenses available. Long Beach, California-based RDC currently works with eight cannabis brands, each with …
ROSENBERG, TEXAS — SuperNova Furniture will open a 40,000-square-foot store at Brazos Town Center, a 550-acre mixed-use development by local developer NewQuest Properties in Rosenberg, a southwestern suburb of Houston. The lease term is 10 years, and the store, which is located in a space formerly occupied by department store Gordman’s, is set to open this fall. The lease pushes the property’s retail occupancy rate to 98 percent. Joe Silver and Chris Pitts of Streetwise Retail Advisors represented the retailer in the lease negotiations.
GILBERT, ARIZ. — Parkview Financial has provided a $28 million construction loan to Scottsdale-based Verde Gilbert LLC for the development of Verde at Cooley Station, a lifestyle center located at 17201-17361 E. Williams Field Road in Gilbert. Verde Gilbert LLC is a joint venture between three development companies led by SB2 Communities. Upon completion, the 10-building, 96,000-square-foot property will offer 44,000 square feet of retail space, 13,000 square feet of office space, 31,000 square feet of restaurant space and 8,000 square feet of fitness space. Designed to be a restaurant-centric, mixed-used project, Verde at Cooley Station will offer 25 spaces for lease and The Green, a large open outdoor lawn area with a gazebo for musical events, fitness classes, movies in the park and other activities. Loan proceeds enabled the commencement of the first phase, which includes retail and a dozen dining concepts surrounded by The Green. Some of the stores are slated to open for business in late 2021, with a planned grand opening in first-quarter 2022. The second phase will include 24,000 square feet of retail space, 12,000 square feet of office space, 3,000 square feet of restaurant space and 8,000 square feet of fitness space. The second …
MIAMI — Los Angeles-based Black Lion Investment Group has acquired a restaurant building in Miami known as Amara at Paraiso. The seller, Related Group, sold the property to Black Lion for $12.1 million. Fabio Faerman and Sebastian Faerman of Miami-based FA Commercial represented both parties in the transaction. Amara at Paraiso is a 12,300-square-foot, Class A retail and dining facility that is part of a larger project that includes the residential complex Paraiso Bay, which contains 1,300 residential units. James Beard Award-winning chef Michael Schwartz is at the helm of the popular indoor-outdoor dining space. Miami-based FA Commercial is the commercial division of Fortune International Realty specializing in investment sales, landlord and tenant representation, market analysis, site selection and portfolio overview.
By Matt Silvers, vice president, Project Management Advisors Inc. From regional malls to small-town shopping districts, the United States has over 1 billion square feet of excess retail space, according to analysis from CoStar Group, with roughly 23 square feet of retail space for every person in the country. For reference, France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Japan all have less than 5 square feet per capita. This surplus is not a new problem, though it has been brought into sharp focus by COVID-19. Retailers closed or cut back their offerings throughout the pandemic while people doubled down on e-commerce, relying on digital solutions for everything from grocery delivery to streaming home entertainment. A recent McKinsey & Co. analysis shows online commerce grew 10 years’ time in just three months, fueled by stay-at-home orders. That study assessed data from the U.S. Census Bureau, which estimated that e-commerce sales accounted for 14 percent of retail sales in 2020, totaling $215 billion versus 11 percent in 2019. While these rapid changes caught some retailers flat-footed, an opportunity now exists to take advantage of available space — and relatively inexpensive rents — to open new stores and try new concepts. For the first …
