Vestar Development Co. has taken over management of the landmark Christown Spectrum Mall in central Phoenix with plans to bring new vitality and increased traffic to the 51-year-old shopping center.
"It's one of the most storied retail properties in Phoenix, and we couldn't be more excited to be involved," said Patrick McGinley, vice president of property management for Phoenix-based Vestar.
It's the third major property-management deal the company has landed in the past few months. Vestar recently took over management of the troubled Westgate City Center project in Glendale and just won a contract to run the Buena Park Downtown Center in Buena Park, Calif.
The 85-acre Christown property is one of metro Phoenix's most successful infill-retail-redevelopment projects. But McGinley believes Vestar's local focus and expertise can take the center to a new level.
"We want to bring some of the programs and marketing expertise we gained at Tempe Marketplace and Desert Ridge (Marketplace) to create a more exciting shopping environment at Christown," he said.
Besides the Desert Ridge and Tempe marketplaces, Vestar manages more than 60 centers in Arizona, California and, recently, Nevada.
Although Christown anchors such as Target, Costco, J.C. Penney and Walmart are thriving, some of the interior spaces are struggling. McGinley hopes to find ways to direct the traffic from the anchors to the interior of the mall to attract new tenants there.
The mall, south of Bethany Home Road between 15th and 19th avenues, opened in 1961 as Chris-Town Center and was the Phoenix area's first enclosed air-conditioned mall. It was named after Chris Harri, a Swiss farmer who settled on the mall site in 1904. Original anchors included Montgomery Ward, J.C. Penney and local department store Korrick's.
The mall flourished until the 1990s when the area fell into decline, and one by one, its anchor stores closed.
The mall was then successfully repositioned by Grossman Properties into a discount-oriented power center called Phoenix Spectrum. The center attracted Walmart, Costco and Target to replace the Broadway, Dillard's and Montgomery Ward. J.C. Penney, which moved out of the mall in 1997, returned a decade later.
The 1.1 million-square-foot center was acquired in 2004 by Developers Diversified Realty and Coventry Real Estate, which changed the name of the mall to Christown Spectrum Mall. The owners managed the property until Vestar was brought in.
Sources: AZ Central, Globe St.
Vestar Development Co. has taken over management of the landmark Christown Spectrum Mall in central Phoenix with plans to bring new vitality and increased traffic to the 51-year-old shopping center.
The property, located at West Bethany Home Road and North 19th Avenue, opened in 1961 as the first indoor, air-conditioned mall in Phoenix. Over the years, the mall had fallen onto hard times with anchors leaving. DDR and Coventry acquired the asset in 2004, invested some capital and boosted occupancy.
The mall was successfully repositioned by Grossman Properties into a discount-oriented power center called Phoenix Spectrum. The center attracted Walmart, Costco and Target to replace the Broadway, Dillard’s and Montgomery Ward. J.C. Penney, which moved out of the mall in 1997, returned a decade later.
Part of Vestar’s plan is to upgrade some of the interiors to attract a national or regional soft-good user. Strategic Retail Group is being called in to handle the leasing.
Though Christown Spectrum is an older mall, and though it went through a “down” period that can plague many older retail centers, the asset now seems to be enjoying some popularity among tenants. Anchor tenants include Walmart, Target, Costco, JCPenney and PetSmart.
Read more at: AZ Central, Globe St.
