Done Deals
Taubman Centers Acquires Lord Associates
Courtney Lord |
Bloomfield Hills, Michigan-based Taubman Centers, Inc. (NYSE:TCO) acquired Lord Associates, a retail leasing firm based in Alexandria, Virginia. The unified acquisition, valued at $7.5 million, includes leasing and service contracts and is for a combination of cash and partnership units to be paid over five years. As part of the transaction, Courtney Lord, president of Lord Associates, becomes a senior vice president - managing director of leasing at Taubman. Lord will relocate to the Detroit area. |
The two companies have a long-standing relationship. Lord began his career with Taubman in 1972 and then served in leasing and senior management positions with Western Development and The Mills Corporation. In 1989, he founded Lord Associates, which worked with Taubman on the successful leasing program for Great Lakes Crossing in Detroit, Michigan and is currently managing the leasing program at the Dolphin Mall in Miami, Florida.
Fourteen employees of Lord Associates will join the Taubman leasing department in various capacities. Lord staff members will complete their current non-Taubman assignments. Taubman will maintain the Lord Associates Alexandria office as the company’s East Coast leasing base.
Taubman Centers, Inc., a real estate investment trust, owns, develops, acquires and operates regional shopping centers nationally. The company currently owns and/or manages 28 urban and suburban regional and super regional shopping centers in 12 states and has more than five million sq.ft. of new retail space emerging from its development pipeline over the next two years. Four centers are under construction and scheduled to open in 2001: Dolphin Mall (Miami, FL), International Plaza (Tampa, FL), The Mall at Wellington Green (Palm Beach County, FL) and The Shops at Willow Bend (Plano, TX).
For more information, contact Robert S. Taubman, president and CEO, or Courtney Lord, senior vice president, managing director of leasing, Taubman Centers, Inc., 200 East Long Lake Road, Suite 300, Bloomfield Hills, MI 48303-0200; 248-258-6800.
Mall in Columbia To Host New L.L. Bean
Freeport, Maine-based outdoor retailer L.L. Bean will open a location at The Rouse Company’s Mall in Columbia in Columbia, Maryland. The 30,000-sq.ft. store will carry apparel, footwear, sporting goods, and home furnishings and will include an L.L. Bean Outdoor Discovery School. Construction is expected to begin in spring 2000, with an anticipated March 2001 opening.
The Columbia location will be the second new store in Bean’s expansion plan, which includes opening several stores over the next three years in the Mid-Atlantic region. Earlier this year, the retailer announced that it would open a 76,000-sq.ft. store at Tysons Corner in McLean, Virginia, the first new store in 88 years outside of Bean’s single, headquarters location in Freeport. The Tysons Corner store is expected to open in July 2000.
The Mall in Columbia is owned and managed by the Rouse Company, which is also based in Columbia. L.L. Bean will join 230 other specialty stores with anchors including Nordstrom, Lord & Taylor, Hecht’s, JCPenney and Sears. In addition to the new L.L. Bean store, Rouse plans to further enhance the Mall in Columbia by opening a multi-screen cinema, three new restaurants, and a Bibelot bookstore.
For more information, contact Bill Shea, senior vice president and general manager of retail, L.L. Bean, 207-552-7878; or Ed Taylor, leasing, the Mall in Columbia, 410-992-6193.
Grubb & Ellis/The Furman Co. Brokers Ivey Square
Charlie Whitmire |
Charlie Whitmire, vice president of the investment services group of Grubb & Ellis/The Furman Co., represented Ivey Investors LLC in the purchase of the Ivey Square office/retail complex in downtown Greenville, South Carolina. The 50,000-sq.ft. building, located at the corner of North Main Street and East North Street, was purchased from Ivey Square Inc. |
Grubb & Ellis/The Furman Co. Property Services Division has been retained by Ivey Investors LLC to manage Ivey Square. The building is currently 95 percent occupied. Tenants include TriVergent Communications, KWB, Atlanta Bread Company, and Bertolo’s Pizza.
Grubb & Ellis/The Furman Co., a part of The Furman Co., Inc., is a full-service real estate and insurance services company, offering its clients expertise in residential and commercial real estate, property management and insurance fees. The company’s property services division provides full-service property and facilities management services for more than 1.3 million sq.ft. of office, retail and industrial properties in upstate South Carolina.
For more information, contact Charlie Whitmire, vice president of the investment services group, Grubb & Ellis/The Furman Co., 7 N. Laurens Street, Suite 1000, Greenville, SC 29602; 864-242-5151, Fax 864-233-9878.
Taubman Forms Joint Venture With Ivanhoe
Taubman Centers, Inc. formed a joint venture and entered into a construction loan financing agreement with Ivanhoe Inc. for the development of the International Plaza in Tampa, Florida, next to the Tampa International Airport. The 1.2-million-sq.ft. center is currently under construction and is scheduled to open September 14, 2001. It will be anchored by Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Lord & Taylor and Dillard’s.
Under the terms of the joint venture agreement, Taubman is managing general partner of the development and Ivanhoe will contribute approximately 80 percent of the joint venture capital.
“This transaction is consistent with our strategic plan to invest in select retail development projects,” says Rene Tremblay, president and chief operating officer of Ivanhoe. Ivanhoe’s portfolio consists of 58 shopping centers located in Quebec, Ontario and the United States with total leasable area of almost 20 million sq.ft. The company is owned by five pension funds. Its majority shareholder is Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec, Canada’s largest fund manager, with assets totaling $83 billion at the end of 1998. Ivanhoe’s head office is located in Montreal, Quebec.
For more information: Barbara Baker, vice president of investor relations, Taubman Centers, Inc., 300 E. Long Lake Road, Bloomfield, MI 48303; 248-258-7367.
Starbucks, Magic Johnson Open Oakland Coffeehouse
Former NBA star Earvin “Magic” Johnson has used his name and development company in a partnership with Starbucks to bring the upscale coffeehouse into untapped urban markets – such as the newly-opened unit on Fruitvale and East 9th Street in Oakland, California. The Fruitvale Starbucks is the first East Bay-area partnership store and one of eleven partnership efforts in urban locations.
Johnson says that the coffeehouses provide community gathering places and that inner cities such as Harlem have welcomed the chain’s arrival. He feels that minority communities want name brands and respond to them. Sales at partnership stores have been comparable to non-urban locations, he says. Proximity to the highway and a shopping center convinced Johnson and Starbucks to choose the Fruitvale location.
For more information: Jim Lovell, director of retail alliances, Starbucks Coffee Corporation, 2401 Utah Avenue S., Seattle, WA 98134, 206-447-7950; Kenn Lombard, president, Johnson Development Corp., 9100 Wilshire Boulevard, Beverly Hills, CA 90212; 310-247-1994.
Sur La Table Plans New Stores
After recently opening new stores in Denver, Colorado and Plano and Houston, Texas, Seattle-based kitchenware retailer Sur La Table has two Arizona locations scheduled to open during 2000.
A 5,903-sq.ft. store was scheduled to open in January at Casa Paloma, an open-air specialty plaza providing upscale shopping and dining for the Chandler, Phoenix, Tempe and Mesa, Arizona areas. A 6,500-sq.ft. store is expected to open in May 2000 at the Kierland Commons Shopping Center in Scottsdale. The Kierland Commons store will feature a kitchen and cooking class program.
Sur La Table owns and operates 13 stores located in California, Washington and Texas. The stores offer kitchen equipment and gadgetry, more than 900 cookbook titles, and in-store cooking demonstrations and classes. The company plans to open 12 to 15 additional stores in 2000.
For more information: Gaye Young, lease administrator, or Melinda Ekadah, store developer, Sur La Table, 1765 6th Avenue S., Seattle, WA 98134; 206-682-7175.
Construction Loan Closed for Millennium Place
Millennium Partners secured a $307-million construction loan from a consortium of banking institutions for the development of Millennium Place, a 1.8-million-sq.ft. project now under construction on Boston Common.
The banks involved in the deal are Fleet Bank, Boston; Dresdner Kleinwort Benson, Germany; Westdeutsche ImmobilienBank, Germany; and Helaba Bank, Germany. This is the third Millennium Partners development that this group of banks has financed, having previously backed Millennium’s Ritz-Carlton development in Washington, D.C. and the Four Seasons Hotel & Residences in San Francisco.
Millennium Place is a $500-million mixed-use development that will feature a 155-room, five-star Ritz Carlton hotel; a Loews Theatres multiplex with 19 screens and seven private screening rooms; a 100,000-sq.ft. Sports Club; 85 rental/extended stay apartments; and 50,000 sq.ft. of retail space. Design elements include two 400-foot-high towers. MDA Partners of Boston is Millennium’s local development partner in Millennium Place and other Boston projects.
New York City-based Millennium Partners is currently developing nearly $3 billion worth of mixed-use real estate in Boston, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., Miami and New York. The company’s stated goal is to “create intelligent, large-scale urban developments that respond to a resurgent demand for dynamic city living.”
For more information, contact Olivia Douglas, project manager, Millennium Partners, 1995 Broadway, New York, NY 10023; 212-875-4900, Fax 212-595-1831.