News
ICSC TEXAS: FOCUS ON THE AIRPORT
November 22, 2010
| Looking beyond the 56M travelers that come in and out of DFW International Airport, there's 7,000 acres for future real estate development, according to DFW Airport VP John Terrell who spoke at the ICSC 2010 Texas at the Gaylord Texan on Thursday. | |
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| We snapped John addressing the post-breakfast crowd in a session titled "The Aerotropolis." As the region's economic engine, the 18,000-acre DFW incorporates lots of non-aviation uses—60% of the airport's revenues come from non-aviation resources, he says. (Getting a Cinnabon sugar high counts as aviation.) About 12,000 acres have been set aside for future long-term operations for runways, terminals, etc., he says, but DFW's land-use plan provides framework for future development and generates more than $63M in annual tax contributions to the cities that border it. “These dollars generated cost these taxing entities nothing. We have the infrastructure, fire, and police services,†John says. “The airport works as a cash cow for the entire region.†| |
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| Running a business in the airport has risks and rewards, says Puente Concessions' Gina Puente (at lectern) with University of North Carolina Kenan Institute director John Kasarda, John, DFW Airport concessions VP Zenola Campbell, Dallas Cowboys Merchandising VP Bill Priakos, and Midway Cos. EVP/COO Jonathan Brinsden. Gina, who opened the first airport winery in the country, says running airport concession businesses has its challenges with security and higher operating costs, but the airport locations provide captive customers (we'll let you decide which definition of "captive" to use) and DFW leaders encourage creativity with new concepts. | |
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| After the aerotropolis (we like that word) presentation, we caught up with a group of ICSC leaders and regional big wigs: Cedar Hill Economic Development director Allison Thompson, DFW ICSC prez and Edge Realty SVP Pam Goodwin, ISCS Texas state director and Colonial Square Ventures managing member George Sakakeeny, ICSC 2010 Texas Conference chairwoman and Archon Group director Kendra Hinderland, and DFW Airport CEO Jeff Fegan. Jeff tells us the airport is ready for its $2B terminal renovations post-Super Bowl (which will bring in about 100k more passengers that week, comparable to Thanksgiving and Christmas weeks). | |
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| Bill prefaced any real estate talk by saying he has no extra Super Bowl tickets to give anyone and, yes, he agrees that the Cowboys should start Dez Bryant. With that out of the way, he says the Cowboys consolidated operations and moved into a new 400k SF facility in the airport's 400-acre International Commerce Park in March. The Cowboys organization is the only NFL team that manufactures and distributes its own products, he says, with 40 retail stores across Texas (six of those in DFW airport) and 700 retail accounts nationwide. More bragging rights: The boys have the highest NFL sales of any team and the highest game-day sales of any team, too. Now, if we only can translate that success to the field. Beating Detroit doesn't count. | |
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| We stopped by the SRS Real Estate Partners booth and snapped SVP Daniel Taylor and EVP/market leader Frank Bullock (with his well used briefcase—we know there's a story there, but he bolted for a meeting before we could ask). We did get Frank to tell us that last year SRS branched out to do landlord rep and is working with national REIT Regency Centers. Disposition work for landlords has picked up, he says. Daniel says he's seeing lots of anchors and junior anchors ramping up building plans because most of the good spaces are gobbled up as soon as they come available. He also tells us retailers are getting creative by shrinking their square footage or designing new configurations. Urban and infill sites have moved back to the forefront as housing starts halted in the ‘burbs. | |
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| We found more SRS leaders at work: left to right around the table, SRS SVP Lynn Dowdle and EVP Mark Newman talking with The Stainback Organization prez Bill Foose, COO/controller Michael Stanton, VP Mark Parks and CEO/chairman Kent Stainback (aka Deion Sanders—we're not sure why, but perhaps he's suffering from convention center toe from visiting all the booths.) Full of smiles—but tight-lipped all the same—Lynn teases that a 2011 deal is in the works, while Kent says he hopes it's a December deal. Meetings and deals were in high fashion: As we walked the floor, we spied Herb Weitzman of The Weitzman Group at their booth. TWG had more than 150 meetings scheduled for the conference, they tell us. |
