Downtown Development Overview

[TheArtist]

Want to support retail downtown? 

Shop at DECOPOLIS this Christmas!

I am putting my heart and soul into this thing, help me and my team out and we will keep trying to grow and be better. I will need to do at least $80,000 in sales during December alone in order to break even for the year (and thats me working all year and not making a dime from the store but putting everything into the business. Thank goodness for my day job lol). That amount is nothing for a mall store, but like everyone has pointed out, its still tough as heck to make it in our downtown! But if I can make it, and I can keep improving and growing, I really hope to make something truly magical and wonderful that we can all be proud of and that you all will love and enjoy.  I promise.

Also per retail downtown, they really need to be requesting lower rents at this point.  Many are wanting too much and spaces sit empty.  I am probably paying more than what my space is currently really worth.  I can fight through it with a LOT of creativity, work and determination, but I am not your average person, and we are not the average store, so can pull it off (hopefully).  Jeff Speck when he was in town also mentioned that as a problem he saw. Get a concentration of retail going and then gradually raise the rates as the critical mass/attraction builds. 

[johrasephoenix]

Keep fighting William!

Unlike a mall, downtown has lots of landowners with lots of buildings each trying to maximize their own income.  At a mall or retail center, you have a single landlord who mix and matches rents to draw the right mix of shops and thus draw the biggest crowds.  In a stroke of genius, when Gerald Hines was developing Houston's mega-famous Galleria he pretty much gave Neiman Marcus their space for free, and then charged the heck out of the little shops and restaurants that lined the pedestrian walkways to Neiman Marcus.  I think a lot of big department stores still get deals like that when they anchor malls and shopping centers.

It's not actually possible, but I do wonder if you had a single motivated owner of all the first floor retail spaces on Boston Avenue if he/she could fine tune rents to attract the right tenant mix.  Maybe in my dream world the first floor retail could be owned separately from the office above, with a single retail specialist developer coordinating tenant attraction. 

Other than parking, etc, it's one of the reasons I've been told that downtown shopping historically couldn't compete with regional malls.   

[davideinstein]

Thompson Building is fairly priced.

[cannon_fodder]

Thompson Building is fairly priced.

Quick! What building is Decopolis in...

Thompson building is currently advertising $12.50 a square for street retail:
http://www.loopnet.com/Listing/14172309/20-E-5th-St-Tulsa-OK/

(But maybe not... poster below points out it appears to be mislabeled office space:

Space 220
Rental Rate   
$12.50 /SF/Year
Max. Contiguous   2,200 SF
Space Available   2,644 SF   Space Type   Street Retail
Min. Divisible   2,200 SF   Lease Type   Full Service)

[davideinstein]

Quick! What building is Decopolis in...

Thompson building is currently advertising $12.50 a square for street retail:
http://www.loopnet.com/Listing/14172309/20-E-5th-St-Tulsa-OK/

Steal.

[TheArtist]

Quick! What building is Decopolis in...

Thompson building is currently advertising $12.50 a square for street retail:
http://www.loopnet.com/Listing/14172309/20-E-5th-St-Tulsa-OK/

Well seeing as there is no available street retail in the Thompson building that may give you a clue that that is not correct.  We had to negotiate down to "more than that" and it goes up each year thereafter.  (They wanted $18 after 4 years in our old spot, which was why we left. The new spot is a much nicer space) I inquired about the Meridia and they were wanting $24 per sq foot ground floor retail space.

Again, may not be bad for office or restaurant, but retail it's still tricky for the traffic isn't there just yet.

I need to do a minimum of $14,000 in sales per month just to break even and keep the doors open (thats not me making anything or much of anything for an advertising budget, etc.) per the hours we are open. 6 days per week x 4= 24 days per month = about $600 in sales per day.  Then days like Mondays are really slow (average about $250 currently), Tuesdays are a tad better, so then other days you need to do hundreds more in sales.  Next year the rent goes up again so will need to have better sales.

So far we are doing it and here is to hoping we have a good Christmas! But I am really going to have to improve my game if I want to make money myself with the store.  It's tough work! 4 years in now and not a dime made (Perhaps I just have lousy product selection if you all think the rent is so cheap?) But hopefully next year we turn the corner and have our costs down, product selections refined, order timing down pat, get a little more traffic,  etc.

[cannon_fodder]

Now when I follow the link I don't see any street level retail listed. Maybe I saw it wrong or the listing has been updated? The office space is listed as $12.50 a square, one would expect the street level retail to be higher (in a mature urban city way, way higher).  In any event - seemed low to me too.

The WayBack Internet Archive shows an advertising for $17.00 for street level retail on the corner:
https://web.archive.org/web/20131027211801/http://www.loopnet.com/Listing/14172309/20-E-5th-St-Tulsa-OK/

(Space 103
Space Available:
5,650 SF
Rental Rate:
$17 /SF/Year
Space Type:
Restaurant
Additional Space Types:
Institutional/ Governmental
Office Building
Creative/Loft
Min. Divisible:
2,532 SF
Lease Type:
Modified Gross
Lease Term:
60 Months
Located in Deco District with entrance off Boston. Soaring ceilings, great exposure at 5th & Boston. Partial Mezzanine available)

I suppose it would depend on build out and the like too...

[Oil Capital]

Now when I follow the link I don't see any street level retail listed. Maybe I saw it wrong or the listing has been updated? The office space is listed as $12.50 a square, one would expect the street level retail to be higher (in a mature urban city way, way higher).  In any event - seemed low to me too.

The WayBack Internet Archive shows an advertising for $17.00 for street level retail on the corner:
https://web.archive.org/web/20131027211801/http://www.loopnet.com/Listing/14172309/20-E-5th-St-Tulsa-OK/

I suppose it would depend on build out and the like too...

It's still there.  The first of 11 spaces listed as available in your link:

Space 220
Rental Rate    

    $12.50 /SF/Year

   Max. Contiguous    2,200 SF
Space Available    2,644 SF    Space Type    Street Retail
Min. Divisible    2,200 SF    Lease Type    Full Service

[saintnicster]

It's still there.  The first of 11 spaces listed as available in your link:

Space 220
Rental Rate    

   $12.50 /SF/Year

   Max. Contiguous    2,200 SF
Space Available    2,644 SF    Space Type    Street Retail
Min. Divisible    2,200 SF    Lease Type    Full Service

That doesn't make a whole lot of sense, though. Suite 220 generally means second floor, and it even shows up on the 2nd floor listing.  There's no street level entrance on that map (http://x.lnimg.com/attachments/9EA00CFF-0A2E-4492-BA00-568666C2691C.pdf)

Going to this site, you can get a marketing flyer for a mezzanine that has the first floor, showing JJ, Decopolis, and that Farmers/whatever firm between Decopolis and Elote.  http://www.showcase.com/property/20-E-5th-Street/Tulsa/Oklahoma/1048316 (map)

EDIT - yeah, and looking at my second link, it verifies the $17 for decopolis's space, while listing 220 as office space. LoopNET's listing is mis-classified, probably has been for years.

[TheArtist]

I believe my ground floor space is "Suite 102" and it's about 3,450 sq feet.

[johrasephoenix]

William - thanks for doing your good work!  We need visionaries like you who keep downtown alive.  I have your sweet "Goddess of Oil" poster in my apartment.

I had a conversation with some folks-in-the-know who said downtown developers need $25/sf to make retail work on the first floor for new construction parking garages, apartments, etc.  That matches up with what the Meridia is charging.  It's really hard to justify though with current downtown foot traffic.  What does rent cost in a more established small footprint retail district like Brookside or Cherry Street?

Hopefully the demand side of the equation will change as all those apartments come on line.  It's residential that drives retail and will ultimately take downtown to the next level.  

I'm really curious how the retail cluster going into the Archer Warehouse will work out.  

[heironymouspasparagus]

Well seeing as there is no available street retail in the Thompson building that may give you a clue that that is not correct.  We had to negotiate down to "more than that" and it goes up each year thereafter.  (They wanted $18 after 4 years in our old spot, which was why we left. The new spot is a much nicer space) I inquired about the Meridia and they were wanting $24 per sq foot ground floor retail space.

Again, may not be bad for office or restaurant, but retail it's still tricky for the traffic isn't there just yet.

I need to do a minimum of $14,000 in sales per month just to break even and keep the doors open (thats not me making anything or much of anything for an advertising budget, etc.) per the hours we are open. 6 days per week x 4= 24 days per month = about $600 in sales per day.  Then days like Mondays are really slow (average about $250 currently), Tuesdays are a tad better, so then other days you need to do hundreds more in sales.  Next year the rent goes up again so will need to have better sales.

So far we are doing it and here is to hoping we have a good Christmas! But I am really going to have to improve my game if I want to make money myself with the store.  It's tough work! 4 years in now and not a dime made (Perhaps I just have lousy product selection if you all think the rent is so cheap?) But hopefully next year we turn the corner and have our costs down, product selections refined, order timing down pat, get a little more traffic,  etc.

You are smashing headlong into that huge rock wall of what so many small retailers run into!   Had some grandparents who tried retail in Owasso long, long ago and it was astounding how even when you do everything "right" it can still be less than thriving.   The times I have been in (usually Saturdays) there seems to be a good number of people walking around looking and many of them buying.  I have a couple of those "off the wall" watches you sell - I haven't been in for a while, so assuming you still sell them - and love them!  Even the reactionaries I work with react favorably to them!  

[TheArtist]

William - thanks for doing your good work!  We need visionaries like you who keep downtown alive.  I have your sweet "Goddess of Oil" poster in my apartment.

I had a conversation with some folks-in-the-know who said downtown developers need $25/sf to make retail work on the first floor for new construction parking garages, apartments, etc.  That matches up with what the Meridia is charging.  It's really hard to justify though with current downtown foot traffic.  What does rent cost in a more established small footprint retail district like Brookside or Cherry Street?

Hopefully the demand side of the equation will change as all those apartments come on line.  It's residential that drives retail and will ultimately take downtown to the next level.  

I'm really curious how the retail cluster going into the Archer Warehouse will work out.  

Thanks! We will keep trucking!  I think for Brookside it can range from around $14 per square foot closer to 41st then as you get to the "hot spot" area it can be around $30 per square foot. 

The cluster around Archer Warehouse should have a little easier time of it for Kaiser wants to see that area succeed and they can through various means "including Guthrie Green" help promote that.  Unfortunately for the Deco District we don't have anything like that it's up to us small businesses to do what we can.

Oh and thanks for purchasing the poster!

[TheArtist]

You are smashing headlong into that huge rock wall of what so many small retailers run into!   Had some grandparents who tried retail in Owasso long, long ago and it was astounding how even when you do everything "right" it can still be less than thriving.   The times I have been in (usually Saturdays) there seems to be a good number of people walking around looking and many of them buying.  I have a couple of those "off the wall" watches you sell - I haven't been in for a while, so assuming you still sell them - and love them!  Even the reactionaries I work with react favorably to them!  

Thanks!  And yes, I know the watches your talking about they are fun. we still have them plus a few more new designs.

I wonder about retail in our downtown. On the one hand I wonder if places like the Brady Arts, Santa Fe and Boxyard will pull all the people to them and leave us in the Deco District as an outlier.  But if I put a positive spin on it, I hope that by having some lively successful retail areas in downtown it will help make downtown in general more of a draw for shopping and help us all out.   But, who knows.  I do know that when I look at my numbers for First Fridays for instance, that Friday is our slowest for everyone goes to that part of downtown.  Who knows what it will be like when we get more areas that will be competing for attention and people.  So yes, you can do everything right, even be exceptional in your own way, but....

[RecycleMichael]

William - thanks for doing your good work!  We need visionaries like you who keep downtown alive.  I have your sweet "Goddess of Oil" poster in my apartment.

I have William's Golden Driller poster in my office.