The Retail Thread

[DizzyEdge]

The thing is, the city actively approves new development which greatly reduces or wipes out existing retail street frontage.

Even with the question "Does Stephen Ave's historical buildings and existing abundance of restaurant make it difficult for it to allow more retailers?"

I can imagine a scenario where:
a) the historic buildings are heavily modified or demolished to increase retail space.
b) eventually that land becomes so valuable that the retail space is demolished for class A office
c) now there's no retail downtown at all

It would be interesting to see a table to downtown core retail sq footage each year over the past 30 years.

[Policy Wonk]

Originally Posted by MichaelS

Hopefully this is something that "The Riff" block in East Village can fix. Also, any idea on how far out of "downtown" retailers like that would be willing to go? Say the Bridgeland/Edmonton Trail connector area?

This retailer wasn't actually seriously looking at downtown, but when they're planning to enter a new market they produce these intelligence reports. The report broke the city down into quadrant and core. They reach out to local customers who either order a lot online or regularly visit US stores and pay them $1500 in giftcards for a day of their time to give the new store team a tour of "their Calgary".

Each community, as defined by census data is rated from 0 to 6 based on demographics and their own metrics. 5 or 6 theoretically supports a store, downtown was only a 3. But it goes further into the discussion of "shopping destinations", where do the people in those communities shop since the 5's and 6's don't necessarily have a suitable mall nearby and they aren't going to build a store in an old Blockbuster Video location.

The issue for Crossiron was that the residents of the communities rated 5 and 6 only really go there on weekends.

[MichaelS]

Thanks for the insight. Very interesting stuff.

[MasterG]

Originally Posted by DizzyEdge

The thing is, the city actively approves new development which greatly reduces or wipes out existing retail street frontage.

Even with the question "Does Stephen Ave's historical buildings and existing abundance of restaurant make it difficult for it to allow more retailers?"

I can imagine a scenario where:
a) the historic buildings are heavily modified or demolished to increase retail space.
b) eventually that land becomes so valuable that the retail space is demolished for class A office
c) now there's no retail downtown at all

It would be interesting to see a table to downtown core retail sq footage each year over the past 30 years.

It would be interesting but the retail square footage would correspond heavily with the Plus 15 network growth. If they tracked ground-level vs. +15 level retail space that would be interesting.

You are right though, the Class A office space market is so much more of a focus. There is a shop in the Core at 2nd Street and 8th Ave that is vacant for 3 years + now. I suspect because the rate is so high and the landlords don't care at all about retail space when office space is a premium. The holding costs of vacant must be relatively immaterial to the big office players. There doesn't seem to be price responsiveness by the landlord to reduce prices to fill space.

[Cage]

Originally Posted by Policy Wonk

This retailer wasn't actually seriously looking at downtown, but when they're planning to enter a new market they produce these intelligence reports. The report broke the city down into quadrant and core. They reach out to local customers who either order a lot online or regularly visit US stores and pay them $1500 in giftcards for a day of their time to give the new store team a tour of "their Calgary".

Each community, as defined by census data is rated from 0 to 6 based on demographics and their own metrics. 5 or 6 theoretically supports a store, downtown was only a 3. But it goes further into the discussion of "shopping destinations", where do the people in those communities shop since the 5's and 6's don't necessarily have a suitable mall nearby and they aren't going to build a store in an old Blockbuster Video location.

The issue for Crossiron was that the residents of the communities rated 5 and 6 only really go there on weekends.

Thanks for the additional explanation.

From the two posts on this issue, the retailer sounds like either a J Crew or Abercrombie and Fitch; a sotre that caters to young female crowd with high dollar spend.

Weekend cross iron issue is very interesting. This retailer should be comming to the same conclusion (e.g. people only shop during the weekends) when they surveyed Eastern Canada and I wonder how their Eastern USA and Chicago stores operate. All these locations have the same issue WRT retail.

[Policy Wonk]

Originally Posted by Cage

Thanks for the additional explanation.

From the two posts on this issue, the retailer sounds like either a J Crew or Abercrombie and Fitch; a sotre that caters to young female crowd with high dollar spend.

Weekend cross iron issue is very interesting. This retailer should be comming to the same conclusion (e.g. people only shop during the weekends) when they surveyed Eastern Canada and I wonder how their Eastern USA and Chicago stores operate. All these locations have the same issue WRT retail.

It is neither, but you're in the right general neighbourhood.

Their ultimate determination was that during the week a Crossiron location wouldn't just be slow, but dead to the world. On a Tuesday night after dinner most of their 5's and 6's would just go to Market Mall or Chinook. Crossiron isn't exactly surrounded by new affluent suburbs the way many newer regional shopping centres are. Across the 400 from Vaughn Mills would be a solid 6.

[Cage]

Originally Posted by Policy Wonk

It is neither, but you're in the right general neighbourhood.

Their ultimate determination was that during the week a Crossiron location wouldn't just be slow, but dead to the world. On a Tuesday night after dinner most of their 5's and 6's would just go to Market Mall or Chinook. Crossiron isn't exactly surrounded by new affluent suburbs the way many newer regional shopping centres are. Across the 400 from Vaughn Mills would be a solid 6.

I purposely picked a couple of chains that are recent Chinook additions to protect your source.

[lubicon]

Originally Posted by Policy Wonk

Some research on Calgary done by a US retailer was shared with me this week.

These were their general conclusions.

- Cross border shopping appears to depress local demand for many goods.

- Marlborough is perceived almost universally negatively, Chinook almost universally positively other than expressed parking frustrations.
.

Interesting about the cross border shopping. Given Calgary's relative isolation from any significant U.S. city I would think it would be the opposite. When people do go to the U.S. from here they do shop like hell, but relatively few people actually go as it is quite inconvenient.

Fully agree on the perception of Marlborough. Thoroughly disagree (personally) on Chinook. I prefer Market Mall.

[Cage]

Originally Posted by lubicon

Interesting about the cross border shopping. Given Calgary's relative isolation from any significant U.S. city I would think it would be the opposite. When people do go to the U.S. from here they do shop like hell, but relatively few people actually go as it is quite inconvenient.

Calgary's cross border isolation would come into play if the retailer had sampled the general population rather than relying exclusively on their frequent customer card database.

What this retailer has tripped into is that most of their current customers take into account a days shopping while down in the USA, part of the vacation is to go shopping and this customer would continue to shop in the USA if the retailer openned a Canadian outlet. THink of the crowd as being and exclusive subset that vacations often in LAS or has a place in PHX or PSP.

The husband golfs and the wife shops at J Crew. Part of shopping at J Crew USA is to get fashion items not available to the Calgary person. Now that J Crew has a Calgary store, anyone can copy this fashionista wife. So instead of shopping at J Crew in Calgary, the fashionista will shop in the USA at a competitor to J Crew. This is how cross border shopping is depressing local demand.

[You Need A Thneed]

Originally Posted by lubicon

Interesting about the cross border shopping. Given Calgary's relative isolation from any significant U.S. city I would think it would be the opposite. When people do go to the U.S. from here they do shop like hell, but relatively few people actually go as it is quite inconvenient.

Fully agree on the perception of Marlborough. Thoroughly disagree (personally) on Chinook. I prefer Market Mall.

Marlborough is just a smaller mall than most of the others. Other than that, there isn't anything wrong with it really.

[Policy Wonk]

Originally Posted by Cage

Calgary's cross border isolation would come into play if the retailer had sampled the general population rather than relying exclusively on their frequent customer card database.

What this retailer has tripped into is that most of their current customers take into account a days shopping while down in the USA, part of the vacation is to go shopping and this customer would continue to shop in the USA if the retailer openned a Canadian outlet. THink of the crowd as being and exclusive subset that vacations often in LAS or has a place in PHX or PSP.

The husband golfs and the wife shops at J Crew. Part of shopping at J Crew USA is to get fashion items not available to the Calgary person. Now that J Crew has a Calgary store, anyone can copy this fashionista wife. So instead of shopping at J Crew in Calgary, the fashionista will shop in the USA at a competitor to J Crew. This is how cross border shopping is depressing local demand.

There were two layers of research, the first was the public at large but semi-anonymously. They only represented themselves as a US fashion retailer. The more intense interviews, the "ethnography studies" as they call them, only slightly sarcastically were known high-spend customers selected because they seemed reasonably intelligent and articulate. They then go about town with them. Where they shop, where they eat, where they play. Just to get in touch with the lifestyles of their local customer. The women are videotaped and then edited down to about ten-fifteen minutes. The only real lucid comparison that comes to mind is a travel show or MTV Cribs.

[lubicon]

Originally Posted by Cage

Calgary's cross border isolation would come into play if the retailer had sampled the general population rather than relying exclusively on their frequent customer card database.

What this retailer has tripped into is that most of their current customers take into account a days shopping while down in the USA, part of the vacation is to go shopping and this customer would continue to shop in the USA if the retailer openned a Canadian outlet. THink of the crowd as being and exclusive subset that vacations often in LAS or has a place in PHX or PSP.

The husband golfs and the wife shops at J Crew. Part of shopping at J Crew USA is to get fashion items not available to the Calgary person. Now that J Crew has a Calgary store, anyone can copy this fashionista wife. So instead of shopping at J Crew in Calgary, the fashionista will shop in the USA at a competitor to J Crew. This is how cross border shopping is depressing local demand.

I will agree with what you are saying for the most part. People love to cross border shop to find things that are new, no question about that. But I would argue the main reason they do is actually price. You can buy the same thing for a whole lot less in the U.S. That's why people cross border shop.

[*Stardust*]

I'm sure this has been discussed here before, but I will bring it up anyways. I was having dinner with my friend at Double Zero pizza downtown this evening, and I totally forgot how The Core shopping centre closes so early. Isn't that one way to increase vibrancy downtown? Why does it not close at the same time as other malls do? (9:00 pm)

Also, has anyone heard anything new about Eau Claire market/district being redeveloped? It's one of the nicest areas in Calgary and it is a shame that it isn't being used to its full potential.

[Denscity]

Originally Posted by *Stardust*

I'm sure this has been discussed here before, but I will bring it up anyways. I was having dinner with my friend at Double Zero pizza downtown this evening, and I totally forgot how The Core shopping centre closes so early. Isn't that one way to increase vibrancy downtown? Why does it not close at the same time as other malls do? (9:00 pm)

Also, has anyone heard anything new about Eau Claire market/district being redeveloped? It's one of the nicest areas in Calgary and it is a shame that it isn't being used to its full potential.

Was just at The Core for the first time and was impressed by the amount of retailers in there but also a bit surprised there were a few prime spaces that were empty. Did I see a space that faced directly onto Stephen? That is the definition of prime for Calgary isn't it? And also it didn't open on Sunday morning till 11:30am. Tim Hortons was open but i was the only one there at 10:45am!!

[kw5150]

That space on stephen has just been recently renovated and split into different retail bays. A good tenant will be in there soon, no doubt. Shame that it only open at 11:30, totally agree.

Originally Posted by Denscity

Was just at The Core for the first time and was impressed by the amount of retailers in there but also a bit surprised there were a few prime spaces that were empty. Did I see a space that faced directly onto Stephen? That is the definition of prime for Calgary isn't it? And also it didn't open on Sunday morning till 11:30am. Tim Hortons was open but i was the only one there at 10:45am!!

[Denscity]

Originally Posted by kw5150

That space on stephen has just been recently renovated and split into different retail bays. A good tenant will be in there soon, no doubt. Shame that it only open at 11:30, totally agree.

Oh ok that makes sense if it hasn't been on the market for that long. Should be snapped up soon I would expect.

[Doug_Cgy]

Originally Posted by Denscity

Oh ok that makes sense if it hasn't been on the market for that long. Should be snapped up soon I would expect.

From what I've been told, tenant is already in place. Just hasn't been announced yet.

[Innersoul1]

I recall someone mentioning that Structube would be coming to Calgary. Anyone have any more information on this? I would really love a bed from there!

Hmmm some simple sleuthing and I answered my own question.

http://www.structube.com/en/our-stor...17th-avenue-sw

[Wooster]

Originally Posted by Innersoul1

I recall someone mentioning that Structube would be coming to Calgary. Anyone have any more information on this? I would really love a bed from there!

They're opening in the corner location at Hanson Square.

[Spring2008]

Yeah, grand opening is on Sept 14th. Also coming to 17th soon is Ette(Bridal shop behind Tomkins park), and Menchies. Both aiming for early Sept openings. Lots going on around 17th lately.