TRD’s updates from ICSC New York: live blog

18.39

Bronx boosterism was the overriding theme at the Women’s Special Industry Group forum, which focused on the outer boroughs.

Marlene Cintron, president of the Bronx Overall Economic Development Corporation, bemoaned the lack of retail in her home borough, noting the fact that she goes to Yonkers to shop at healthy grocer Trader Joe’s.

Cintron joined Seth Bornstein, executive director of the Queens Economic Development Corporation; Caroline Pardo, director of leasing at Brooklyn-based Two Trees Management; Donald Cappocia of Brooklyn-based BFC Partners; Patricia Dunphy, senior vice president at Rockrose; and Melissa Burch, Forest City Enterprises’ executive vice president at the panel, hosted by Douglas Elliman retail star Faith Hope Consolo. The group discussed what might enliven parts of the outer boroughs that have yet to see retail rents and tourism explode as they have in Manhattan.

While the Bronx has the highest grossing J.C. Penney in the nation, as well as the third highest-grossing big box grocer BJ’s and third highest-grossing Target, other up-market retailers still scorn the region, Cintron said. “We have no Fairway, no Whole Foods and no Trader Joe’s,” she told the crowd.

Faith Hope Consolo

While incentives from her office are available – and the borough offers plenty of space – Trader Joe’s has declined to open because the borough does not meet certain “educational requirements,” she said. But neighborhoods like Riverdale have high incomes and rates of college graduation, she said.

“It’s a perception issue. Why are they still not coming? It’s a lack of being open-minded,” Cintron said. The borough cannot even track tourism at the moment, she added, because the Bronx still lacks a single full-service hotel.

The retail industry needs to hear the complaints of local leaders such as Cintron more often, Consolo said, and find new ways to address communities’ needs, including with alternative retail.

“People have a certain perception, but then there is a certain reality,” which is that large pools of untapped consumers lie in outer boroughs away from many brokers’ minds, Consolo said. “I hear Brooklyn, Brooklyn, Brooklyn,” she said. “These days I feel like I have to defend Manhattan.”

But even in Manhattan, the Seward Park and Delancey Street areas can support additional retail, and have been skipped over in favor of Williamsburg to the east, said Cappocia.

Other areas need their cheerleaders a la Marty Markowitz, Consolo said. Markowitz has famously repeatedly entreated Apple (which is finally seeking space in Brooklyn, as The Real Deal first reported) to lease in his home borough.

Consolo suggested additional pop-up shops, as well as support for “clicks-to-bricks” businesses, to spur retail development in the outer boroughs. She also suggested landlords consider below grade retail, a setup much more common in the United Kingdom and Canada.

“Pop-ups carried us through the downturn,” she said. “It’s really helped a lot of neighborhoods.” — Guelda Voien

18.26

It’s party time. ICSC brokers and landlords are heading out now to a handful of parties tonight hosted by brokerage firms such as Newmark Grubb Knight Frank and landlords such as the Howard Hughes Corporation, which owns South Street Seaport.

Newmark is hosting the most widely anticipated party, according to an anecdotal sample of ICSC attendees, at Tao, at 92 Ninth Avenue in the Meatpacking District.

Another large event is Cushman & Wakeman’s fete at Oceana, at 120 West 49th Street in Midtown, closer to the New York Hilton Midtown, the location of most of the ICSC activity. Other parties include SRS Real Estate Partners party at 48 Lounge at 1221 Sixth Avenue in Midtown and Ripco Real Estate partnering with Kimco Realty to host an event at Lavo Nightclub at 39 East 58th Street.

Howard Hughes, in partnership with the brokerage RKF, is hosting an event at the Back Room at Nobu Fifty Seven at 40 West 57th Street.

A few firms have opted for smaller events. Forest City Ratner is bringing about 30 people to watch pop singer Pink perform at Barclays Center in Brooklyn. –Adam Pincus

10.56

From left: Forest City Ratner’s Katherine Welch, Brenda Benter and James Cory

Forest City Ratner has engaged a branding firm update the public space and some retail areas in the sprawling commercial complex Metrotech in Downtown Brooklyn. The building, constructed about 20 years ago as a back-end office site, now finds itself in the middle of a resurgent neighborhood.

Metrotech pioneered the Downtown market with the large development of office buildings. Now, Forest City Ratner is responding to the increased interest in the area, Katherine Welch, company executive vice president, told The Real Deal at an interview at her booth at the New York Hilton & Towers.

The firm currently has about eight retail locations in its Metrotech properties, Welch said. It expects to add another approximately 10,000 square feet of retail on the ground floor and second levels through recaptured space that is currently used as lobby or service space in “one or two” of the buildings. She declined to identify which buildings.

“We started talking about it about six months ago, and we put pen to paper and [engaged] someone in the last three weeks,” Welch said.

The future space is not being marketed yet. The company expects to recapture the space in the next 12 months, and will then put it on the market, she said. – Adam Pincus

08.09

From left: Ron Moelis, Nick Pascarelli, Michael Miller, Christina Warner and Chase Welles at Providence

The International Council of Shopping Centers New York National Conference kicks off this morning for the two-day event taking place officially at the New York Hilton & Towers and the Sheraton New York & Tower. However, the conference includes additional unofficial locations for mall giants such as Westfield Group and developer Related Companies, which are taking meetings at the nearby Warwick Hotel. And of course the parties, where brokers and owners hobnob in their quest to track down leads and firm up relationships.

From left: Vornado’s Sherri White and SCG Retail’s David Firestein at Providence

While this conference, which attracts about 7,000 attendees each year, is just a fraction of ICSC’s annual RECon event held each year in Las Vegas, which pulled in more than 32,700 professionals in May, much of New York’s retail community will stop by the show.

Most of the parties are Monday night, but a few firms got a jump on the action. SCG Retail and its parent company Shopping Center Group hosted a party last night at the Hell’s Kitchen nightclub Providence. Attendees included Newmark Grubb Knight Frank’s Jeffrey Roseman and Vornado Realty Trust’s Sherri White. Other firms such as Ackman-Ziff Real Estate Group hosted dinners. — Adam Pincus