News
Cowtown's First Sprouts
June 7, 2010
| Weingarten Realty Investors' took a risk this spring when it couldn't come to terms with its 60k SF Albertsons grocery anchor at 463k SF Overton Park Plaza. But the gamble paid off when within a few weeks when the company signed Fort Worth's first trendy Sprouts Farmers Market. | |
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| Sprouts will occupy 30k SF, leasing exec Daniel Goldware tells us. Although it was tough to lose an anchor tenant, Daniel says Sprouts is a new concept anticipated to drive lots of new traffic to the center and market. The location across I-20 from Hulen Mall is also an ideal site for the organic grocer, he says. | |
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| Sprouts, an Arizona-based natural foods retailer, has 44 locations. Though this is the first in the Fort Worth area, it joins nine in Dallas and four in Austin. The store will open in early 2011 because construction couldn't be completed by Oct. 1, and Weingarten wants to avoid building during the Christmas shopping season. (Alas, no arugula in our stocking this year.) The departure of 32k SF Circuit City's anchor spot (after the company filed bankruptcy) served as a catalyst to freshen up the shopping center, Daniel tells us. | |
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| Weingarten plans a $2M renovation of the center (rendering above), which was one of the original power centers in Fort Worth. Among improvements will be stone and stucco added throughout, and new landscaping. In addition to the former Circuit City space (between The Sports Authority and Office Depot) is a 30k SF site next to Sprout's, several 1k to 2k sites, and a 6k SF pad site facing I-20. Other tenants: PetsMart, Goody Goody, and TJ Maxx. Daniel believes the "great demographics, central location, and lack of new development will draw interest in these spaces." |
