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Feature Article, October 2006
Retail On Pointe
New Plan Excel’s Pointe Orlando is being redeveloped to capture a growing market.
Randall Shearin
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The new feel of Pointe Orlando will be that of a lifestyle center.
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Retail changes with time, and centers must respond to those changes. That’s especially so when a center has a tourism market who will drive by if the tenants aren’t what they have in mind.
At New Plan’s Pointe Orlando in Orlando, Florida, traffic has always been steady. The center’s location on International Drive just a few blocks from the Orange County Convention Center and three of the largest hotels in the area have guaranteed the center a flow of traffic. Originally envisioned as an entertainment center, Pointe Orlando opened in August 1997 as a mix of restaurants, theater, and large-scale tenants. It was one of the first entertainment centers that really went after Orlando’s tourist dollar. Anchored then by FAO Schwarz and Muvico Pointe 21 Theaters, Pointe Orlando was over-the-top, but it was successful because it was what consumers wanted.
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Water features and new facades — along with new tenants — will take Pointe Orlando from entertainment center to lifestyle center.
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“The design of Pointe Orlando when it first opened was such that the center focused inward,” says Susan Godorov, director of marketing for New Plan, who has worked on Pointe Orlando since it was in the development stages. “It was an open-air center, but it was still focused away from International Drive. That was still the trend at the time.”
With the 1 million-square-foot expansion of the convention center a few years ago, New Plan began to think about what it needed to capture more of an audience from the millions of conventioneers who visit the city and stay nearby each year. In 1999, there were 28,000 hotel rooms on International Drive. At the end of 2006, there will be more than 35,000 hotel rooms. That number will continue to rise as the Peabody Hotel is adding 880 rooms, a Hilton and a Solis hotel will add a total of over 1,700 rooms and the master plan for a project coming out of the ground adjacent to Pointe Orlando includes 10,000 units of hotel, condo, townhomes and estate homes. Ten years ago, there were no residents on International Drive. The answer for New Plan was to create a lifestyle center that also has a large element of entertainment.
When FAO Schwarz closed its doors a few years ago, New Plan was already considering a renovation and remodel of Pointe Orlando. Excel Realty Trust developed the center in 1997 with developer Western Asset Management. When New Plan merged with Excel in 1998, it acquired Pointe Orlando along with a number of other centers. New Plan has made modifications to Pointe Orlando throughout the years. The center always had good retailers who had good performance.
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Restaurants, such as The Capital Grille, anchor the new Pointe Orlando.
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“We took a hard look at the property and realized that retail was changing and the players were changing,” says Godorov. “International Drive was also changing dramatically.”
New Plan is spending $40 million to redevelop Pointe Orlando. The company has removed 140 feet of frontage along International Drive to open the center up to the street. This has taken the center from 450,000 square feet down to 420,000 square feet. The company has scaled back the footprint of the former FAO Schwarz store. The building now houses The Capital Grille restaurant, which opened in March 2006. The surfaces of the center will also change. The exterior is being changed from the concrete and steel of the ‘90s entertainment center to brick and stucco. This will add an organic, timeless look to the property. Additional landscaping, lighting and water features are also being added.
New Plan is also re-leasing a large percentage of the space at Pointe Orlando. Restaurants are a big part of this focus. New Plan wants to capture the convention-goers and locals with restaurants not currently offered in the market. All of the restaurants are new to the market — hard to do in a market like Orlando. The restaurants that New Plan has signed, in addition to The Capital Grille, include Maggiano’s, The Oceanaire Seafood Room, Tommy Bahama’s Tropical Café and Emporium, The Grape, Taverna Opa, B.B. King Blues Club and Maggie Moo’s Ice Cream and Treatery. Retailers who’ve renewed or are building new stores at the center include Victoria’s Secret, Express, Sunglass Hut, Brighton, Bath & Body Works and Chico’s. Muvico Pointe 21 Theatres continues to anchor the project with its successful unit at the center.
“We work closely with the large convention hotels like The Peabody and both Rosen Hotels and they kept telling us that they were losing groups because there were not enough fine dining options on International Drive,” says Godorov. “The selection was limited before we announced them.”
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Relaxed seating areas and new landscaping helped to reformulate Pointe Orlando.
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About 65 percent of Pointe Orlando’s customers are tourists. The center does a lot of marketing to directly market to them. It has a guest service program that works with all the concierges at local hotels to inform them about the center. Concierges also have a voucher they can give to guests that can be redeemed at the center for a coupon book. Pointe Orlando also does a lot of pre-marketing to groups who are headed to Orlando through leads it gets from the Orlando/Orange County Convention and Visitors Bureau.
After the redevelopment is complete in mid-2007, Godorov doesn’t see the percentage of tourist traffic changing. Instead, she says, she sees the number of people coming to the center increasing.
“We have always attracted a good local crowd,” she says. “The theater and the bars and restaurants have always attracted a large local audience for us, especially on the weekend. On a Saturday night, it is about 50-50 residents-to-tourists here.”
New Plan, who has technically been involved with this center from its inception, sees continuing potential for Pointe Orlando. The upside potential to the center continues as the area continues to grow.
©2006 France Publications, Inc. Duplication or reproduction of this article not permitted without authorization from France Publications, Inc. For information on reprints of this article contact Barbara Sherer at (630) 554-6054.
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