Shopping Centers Today is the news magazine of the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC)
Issue link: https://sct.epubxp.com/i/231459
LaSalle says. Whole Foods is entering secondary and in-fill markets, according to Josiah Glafenhein, a broker at Knoxville, Tenn.–based Baker Storey McDonald Properties. One of those is to open in Knoxville this year in a 35,000-square-foot space. U.S. real estate is "recovering from the recovery," according to PricewaterhouseCoopers, which also says a stabilizing housing recovery is giving an unexpected boost to retail economies. The five markets to watch this year are, in alphabetical order, Dallas–Fort Worth, Houston, New York City, San Francisco and San Jose. Houston and Dallas–Fort Worth are seeing groundup retail construction again, mostly grocery-anchored shopping centers. In that metro area alone, at least six Kroger stores, six Walmart Neighborhood Market stores, five WinCo Foods, three Whole Foods Markets and two Sprouts Farmers Markets are set to open this year and next, according to Dallas-based Weitzman Group. "If you look at it from a growth perspective, there was next to no new construction from 2008 to 2013," said David Palmer, head of Dallas–Fort Worth development for Weitzman DOLLAR STORES PLANS TO ADD 1,300 STORES IN ThE AGGREGATE ThIS YEAR. partner Cencor Realty. In the interim, about a half a million people moved to the region — the reason that ground-up development is back in the area, he says. In Houston Aldi has already completed a dozen of the 30 stores it plans to build there through this year. Not all the North American news is rosy. Target is reassessing Canada after a rollout of roughly 100 stores last year fell short of sales goals. Jones Group — owner of Jones New York, Anne Klein, Nine West and others — will be closing 170 underperforming U.S. stores this year to pad its portfolio with a higher percentage of outlet stores, a channel that happens to be enjoying explosive expansion. Jones Lang LaSalle sees a tempering of global growth by U.S. retailers. "Some are hitting the pause button," Kornberg said. "Expansion is hard enough in your home country, let alone foreign soil, where you're thousands of miles from home base." One of the toughest challenges is setting up efficient distribution networks abroad, Kornberg says. Conversely, of the foreign retailers expanding to America, • Primark says it will consider opening stores in the U.S. The Irish fast-fashion chain, which already operates 256 stores in the U.K., Germany, the Netherlands and Spain, opened its first French stores this winter. The idea for a U.S. move is "purely exploratory," a spokesman says, and is one of several expansion strategies the chain is looking into. • Topshop owner Arcadia says it will open 150 international franchise stores for its Topshop, Topman, Burton, Dorothy Perkins and Miss Selfridge brands next year, many of them in Asia, including Vietnam and Australia. Topshop will also be opening its first New Zealand stand-alone store and is eyeing a move into China following its June launch in Hong Kong. • Toys 'R' Us Inc. says it plans to add some 900,000 square feet of store space to its portfolio this year, including 19 new, converted or relocated Toys 'R' Us stores and nine new outlet stores in the U.S. The company says it will open wholly owned stores in Europe: France, Germany, Poland, Spain and the U.K.; and in Asia: Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Taiwan and Thailand. Plans also call for 22 new licensed stores in Denmark and Norway; Egypt, Israel and Saudi Arabia; South Africa; and the Philippines and South Korea. The most significant expansion plans for this year are reserved for China, the company says, where it has already begun operating several of an additional 22 new stores. This follows the launch of an e-commerce site and the opening of the company's first Beijing stores last year. By year-end the company aims to operate about 50 stores across nearly 30 Chinese cities. J an ua ry 20 14 / SCT 31