Santa Fe Place mall, on the city’s south side, underwent a major overhaul and a name change a decade ago, but has struggled since then to keep tenants in its storefronts, both large and small. The mall is now trying to lure two major retailers, Cost Plus World Market and Bed, Bath & Beyond, and plans a renovation project to accomodate them. Clyde Mueller/The New Mexican
The Santa Fe Place mall, which has struggled in recent years to keep its storefronts full following a massive overhaul and name change a decade ago, is pursuing two new major retail tenants already located in the city: Cost Plus World Market and Bed, Bath & Beyond.
The move, which is not a done deal, would be good news for the mall — which underwent an interior face-lift just last summer and plans another improvement project that’s tied to the proposed new anchor tenants. But the change would leave another gaping hole at the Sanbusco Market Center in downtown Santa Fe. Cost Plus World Market opened a 14,700-square-foot store at Sanbusco in 2000 and has been one of the biggest tenants at the center, which has faced financial difficulties in the last couple of years, following the loss in 2011 of a Borders bookstore in its largest retail space.
The relocation effort also would leave a hole at Cerrillos Marketplace on Cerrillos Road, where Bed, Bath & Beyond has been located since 2002. Bed, Bath and Beyond purchased the Cost Plus chain in 2012, and the two businesses would be adjacent tenants at the mall.
Darrell Dyer, general manager at the local Cost Plus store, confirmed Friday that a move is anticipated, but he said nothing has been finalized.
“The word on the street, so to speak, is that yeah, we’re going to be moving to Santa Fe Place mall toward the end of the year,” Dyer said Friday. “But I haven’t gotten anything, like a lease is signed, and we’re not putting up any signs or anything like that until our corporate office says it’s a done deal.”
Efforts to reach a corporate executive were unsuccessful Friday.
The general manager at Santa Fe’s Bed, Bath & Beyond store did not return a message seeking comment, but an employee who answered the phone at the store said a move is anticipated.
The mall plans to remodel the northeast portion of the building that formerly housed the UA North movie theater to accommodate the two new tenants, according to city documents.
“The two businesses will be side by side,” Dan Esquibel, a senior land-use planner, wrote in a memo to the Santa Fe Planning Commission, which approved a request Thursday for a sign variance to allow the mall to install signs bigger than the 80-square-foot maximum.
Dawn Harmon, the mall’s general manager, would not confirm that the two businesses were moving to the mall and told The New Mexican that plans were very preliminary. She said the sign variance from the Planning Commission is just one step in a long process.
“There are a lot of other things that need to fall into place,” she said.
The 570,299-square-foot Santa Fe Place mall sits on 57 acres at Rodeo and Cerrillos roads and includes more than 3,000 parking spaces. It is owned by an investment trust and managed by the Spinoso Real Estate Group. While struggling to keep tenants in it smaller retail spaces, the mall also has seen the loss of two movie theaters in the last decade. Regal Entertainment Group closed its 850-seat United Artists South theater in 2007, just two years after the mall changed hands and spent millions of dollars renovating and trying to create a new brand. The north theater’s closing followed in 2011.
A Mervyn’s department store, which had been a mall anchor for years, closed in 2008, leaving the large retail space mostly vacant until 2012, when Sports Authority moved in.
The mall’s owners announced the redevelopment last summer of its food court, as well as other improvements, including free WiFi service.
But according to JenkinsGavin Design and Development, a Santa Fe-based development management firm, the effort to revamp the shopping center isn’t over yet.
The remodel of the old movie theater, the firm wrote in a statement to the city Planning Commission, is “a critical step toward the much needed revitalization of the Santa Fe Place mall.”
Images presented by JenkinsGavin on Thursday also showed the mall wants to create more of an outdoor setting.
“From what we saw, the parklets and open space and making that whole area just more attractive, it’s a better plan,” said Vince Kadlubek, a Planning Commission member. “It’s a more 21st-century plan.”
In its application for the sign variance, JenkinsGavin Design wrote that “adequate signage is necessary in order for the mall renovation and addition to move forward.”
“Clearly recognizable and visible building signs are a critical element in attracting customers to any retail store,” the firm wrote in its application letter. “The Tenants need to ensure that they can adequately advertise their stores via signs that are proportionate to the building and clearly visible from Rodeo Road.”
Kadlubek said Santa Fe’s south side has been hoping “for a long time” that the mall, which used to be called Villa Linda Mall, would find a new identity.
“This seems like a good step,” he said.
“I’m excited to see any sort of activity at the Santa Fe Place mall that shows some amount of positive growth,” Kadlubek said. “It’s exciting to see that there’s a new ownership group that is willing to reinvent that property, and then it’s exciting to see that there are tenants who are responding to that new ownership group’s direction.”
By: Daniel J Chacón (Santa Fe New Mexican)
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By: Daniel J Chacón (Santa Fe New Mexican)
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