Simon Property Group, the Indianapolis-based retail giant
that owns 200-plus shopping malls nationwide, is sacrificing more than 400
parking spaces at its King of Prussia Plaza and Court to make room for at least
50 new stores and restaurants that it hopes will draw more wealthy shoppers to
the region's biggest retail complex.
At extra-large shopping centers such as King of Prussia,
at least, "the mall business is good, contrary to some of the
naysayers," David Contis, president of Simon Malls and a corporate senior
vice president, told me Monday.
His company bought out other investors to take control of
the King of Prussia mall in 2011, in deals that valued the complex at over $1
billion.
Contis said he expected to attract luxury stores from
outside the region and "the best of the Philadelphia eateries" to the
new space, rather than shifting current tenants there.
General contractor IMC Construction Inc., of Malvern,
began work this year to prepare for tearing down the parking deck next to
Neiman Marcus and adding 155,000 square feet of new stores and restaurants.
Besides the new enclosed area, which will connect the
existing Neiman Marcus, Macy's, and Bloomingdale's department stores, Simon
plans a replacement parking deck with valet-parking areas, digital sensors that
will post the number of vacant spaces available, and ramps the company says are
designed to speed traffic in and out, among other amenities.
The project will reduce total parking spaces at the
center to 12,728 from 13,199, the company said.
"We spent two years figuring this out. That's
lightning speed in this business," Contis said.
Upper Merion Township says the King of Prussia complex
attracts about 25,000 shoppers a day, ballooning to 125,000 at the height of
the holiday shopping season.
Mall stores employ about 6,000, compared with 17,000 at
the nearby King of Prussia Industrial Park, which includes offices for Lockheed
Martin, GlaxoSmithKline, eBay, and other big companies.
Contis wouldn't say how much Simon intends to spend on
the King of Prussia mall expansion.
The company says this is one of 31 U.S. mall-improvement
projects to which it has committed a total of $1.7 billion this year. Simon
also owns the newly renamed Philadelphia Mills complex in Northeast
Philadelphia, the new Gloucester Premium Outlets in South Jersey, and
Montgomery Mall, where Simon recently replaced an empty department store with a
Wegmans grocery, among others.
In a conference call with investors last month, David
Simon, Simon Property Group's chairman and chief executive, said his company
had needed agreement from Sears before finalizing its King of Prussia expansion
plans.
Sears last month announced the closing of its King of
Prussia store, which it has leased to Dick's Sporting Goods and the
Ireland-based Primark department-store chain.
Primark is "certainly not a luxury store," but
will bring new traffic to its end of the mall, Simon told the investors.
Source: Philly.com
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