Shopping Centers Today is the news magazine of the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC)
Issue link: https://sct.epubxp.com/i/390025
he concept of cross-trAInInG — prActIcInG multiple sports with a view toward ramping up one's overall level of fitness — is commonplace today in athletics. can a similar approach among shopping center developers yield similar benefits? some developers who started off in retail say their background doing things like running stores or finding sites for national chains con- tinues to prove invaluable now that they sit at the other end of the negotiating table. "there is no better experience for a developer than to have been on the retail side," said sandra G. Yavitz, owner of Yavitz cos., a seal Beach, calif.–based development and consulting firm. "to- day when young people who are getting into the development business ask me what they should do, I tell them to go get a job with a retailer. not only do you see what happens within a retail group, but you also see a ton of real estate and learn to analyze it from a retailer's perspective." Yavitz should know. over the course of her career, she has moved between senior development and retail positions several times. her first retail job came in the mid-1980s after carl Karcher, founder of the carl's Jr. hamburger chain, hired her to acquire sites for 20 carl's Jr. restaurants across Arizona, california and nevada. In 1987 Yavitz seized an opportunity to experience life in the development world. Bill carver, a friend and business acquaintance impressed with Yavitz' passion for real estate, asked her to become vice president of development for his carver cos. over the next five years, she developed roughly 1 million square feet of grocery- and drugstore-anchored neighbor- hood and community shopping centers in coachella Valley, calif., and Las Vegas. her responsi- bilities ran the gamut, from acquiring sites and securing entitlements, to leasing projects and hiring architects and contractors. "I could not have asked for anything better," she said. Yavitz' cross-training also has included opening about 40 new or relocated stores as vice T cross- trAIners Developers who began their careers as retailers say the experience helpeD make them far better custoDians of their real estate anD their tenants By Joel Groover o c t o b e r 2 0 1 4 / S C T 49 p h o t o : G e o r G e J t o L A n d I I I / s I x t h r I B p h o t o G r A p h Y