You know Sarasota has arrived when the Taubman family builds a shopping mall here.
Taubman Centers partnered with Benderson Development to build the new Mall at University Town Center. We are making our first official visit on Saturday, but I attended the media tour on Wednesday evening and took advantage of the opportunity to chat with William Taubman, chief operating officer of the company, and his father, A. Alfred Taubman.
The elder Taubman, 90, founded his famous shopping-mall company in 1950. For this event, he wore a hand-made three piece black suit.
Alfred Taubman, who founded his mall development company in 1950, at the opening of the Mall at University Town Center in the Cheesecake Factory. Staff photo / Harold Bubil; 10-15-2014.
He calls shopping malls "centers."
And he is proud of this one.
"I think it is a beautiful center; I think it is probably one of the best we’ve ever done," said Alfred Taubman, who founded the company in Michigan in 1950. He saw the middle class moving to the suburbs in the postwar years and wondered where they would shop. So he built his first center.
The idea caught on quickly. By 1957, Sarasota had two shopping centers, Ringling and South Gate. The shopping center became the go-to place.
Eventually, Sarasota Square Mall and DeSoto Square were built, and South Gate was enclosed and the Publix super market replaced with Saks Fifth Avenue. For the upscale mall experience, Tampa's International Plaza was the place.
Until now.
"And it’s 95 percent leased -- that is what’s amazing about this -- and 75 percent open," said the elder Taubman, quite calm amid the media frenzy inside the Cheesecake Factor. "That’s amazing."
William S. "Billy" Taubman in the Cheesecake Factory at the Mall at University Town Center. Staff photo / Harold Bubil; 10-15-2015.
Taubman Centers built International Plaza, as well as Mall of Millennia in Orlando and Waterside Shops in Naples. "We own a center in Miami that is a big winner, and are building a new center in Miami with Bloomingdale’s and Macy’s.
"Florida has been an excellent market for us. Years ago, I had chances to come into Florida and I wouldn’t come in. It wasn’t permanent, it was touristy – two months a year, three months a year, that sort of thing. But it changed; it became industrial."
But Alfred Taubman says the state has only one problem. "If our scientists are correct and we don’t do anything about the environment, this might be flooded with water one day. That’s a problem. They are going to have to figure out what Netherlands did in terms of holding back the water. It’s a little scary, but we’ve always been innovative enough to figure it out. I’m sure we’ll figure it out in the future."
After leading the media for a tour of the new mall, William Taubman, known as Billy, answered a few questions for me. Chief among them was whether Nordstrom will someday occupy the fourth department store pad at the mall.
The media tour the Mall at University Town Center on Oct. 15, 2014. Staff photo / Harold Bubil; 10-15-2014.
"At one time, Nordstrom was committed to this project, in the first version," said the COO. "That will come down to Nordstrom’s strategy from a location standpoint. We have the ability to put them in, but it has to make sense in terms of where we see the direction of the property. It was all designed for four stores. It is all set up and all the systems are in."
The fourth department store would be on the east side of the mall, across from Saks and to the south a bit. It would have prime visibility from Interstate 75.
"We will see what the customer wants and what she needs," said Billy Taubman. "We have the two best department stores with Dillard’s and Macy’s. We have one of the best upscale department stores with Saks. Nordstrom and Bloomingdale's operate that middle section in between. I think it would make sense, but we will see where the customer is spending her money."
More Q&A with Billy Taubman:
VIPs in the lobby of the Mall at University Town Center, Oct. 15, 2014. Staff photo / Harold Bubil; 10-15-2014.
Q. How long have you been working on the UTC project.
A. We were partners with Forbes and stopped construction during the financial crisis, because honestly, the world seemed to be falling apart, and people were concerned about signing leases and financing. So we pulled back.
"Three and a half years ago we began working again. Forbes was working on other things, so we decided to pursue it with Benderson directly.
Q. What other projects do you have going on?
A. "We opened Salt Lake City with the Mormon Church as our partner two years ago. We have a project opening in San Juan next year, and a project opening in spring 2016 in Hawaii; 2017 in downtown Miami. We have other projects in the works but to early to say."
Q. So UTC is the only mall in the country to open this year?
A. It is the only upscale mall to open this year.
"Summerlin Town Center in Las Vegas opened with Macy’s and Dillard’s. That started construction before the financial crisis, stopped, and they finished it up. It's an open-air mall. An expansion of an existing center opened in the Bronx with Penny’s and Macy’s.
"UTC is the only ground-up fresh start, and the only upscale mall.
Q. I notice you don't have Gucci and Cartier, among the stores found at your other Florida malls.
A. We don’t have as much of that. There was an article in Women's Wear Daily today about the pullback in luxury. They have been less expansionist, and a lot of that is timing.
"I have no doubt that they would do business here. The issue is, from a strategic standpoint, they have been pulling back in terms of new openings and focusing only on existing stores and the highest profile expansions. Over time we will get them because the opportunity exists. It is a matter of timing."
Q. What are your emotions as the Mall at UTC opens?
A. I have been through so many of these, have opened so many malls over the years. I am always very proud and very happy, and I relax, but then I have the next thing I am working on.
"Personally, there is an inverse relationship between the status of the project and how much time I spend on it. When we are at the early stage and look at the piece of ground and are starting to talk to the department stores and are looking at the market research and conceptualizing the design and the vision of the project, I am incredibly hands-on.
"But as the time moves on, my involvement decreases. We have teams of people who take over and are in charge of executing that vision and leasing. I am involved with the key tenants, but I have not been involved in Sarasota for the past year. Everybody else takes over. But when it was a piece of dirt and I was romancing the department stores and I was working with (architect) Ron Loch and his team and creating and envisioning the character of the project -- What does Sarasota feel like to us? How does the access work? Show me where the restaurants are going to go. What is the merchandising? -- when we were focused on that, I was very involved. But today, I am involved in the next thing.
Q. The big decision is deciding where to build, right?
A. Our partner, Benderson, owned this land and we always knew this was the No. 1 corner in town with the exit on Interstate 75.
Q. Are you placed right with regard to competing malls?
A. It is 100 miles to Waterside Shops in Naples. There is nothing in Fort Myers that’s directly competitive.
It doesn’t matter if you are a couple miles one way or another. You are only going to go up so far. I think we are going to take market out of Brandon. The better customer that lives near Brandon will decide they can drive 30 minutes and get to our mall, which has so much more to offer. Some of the Fort Myers business will come north, because what we are offering is so much more than what exists in Fort Myers today.
"It’s just the quality and the depth of the merchandise. This is 900,000 square feet, so as a result we have such a range of merchandise. We have more than 100 stores opening today and another 15 in the next month or two. It will be fully open by the spring.
Q. How much better is the Dillard’s here than the one it replaces at South Gate?
A. It is twice the size, but it also has all the new ideas. It’s a great store, Macy’s is a great store and Saks is twice the size than the stores that existed, with much better merchandise. They created “A” stores here, where everything else in the market was a “B” store.
