November 2005 Cover Story Features

Cover Story

Outlet retailing: Europe and beyond
As Value Retail PLC prepares to open the 128,000-sf Ingolstadt Village Outlet Shopping in Bavaria, McArthurGlen is looking beyond Europe to expand its portfolio. Plus, updates on projects in South Africa, Australia, Belgium, Romania and more.

Features

News Up Front
West Point Stevens has a new owner and a new name; the Colonnade Outlets at Sawgrass is set to open in early December and Coach’s outlet chain contributes in a big way to the leathermaker’s financials.

Petsen$e Starts Up
The man who launched the first PetSmart stores opens an outlet version of the pet-supplies chain, Petsen$e, with more than 30 units scheduled to be launched by yearend 2006. The new outlet retailer has four openings before Christmas 2005.

Convention Wrap-Up
Attendees to Value Retail News’ Fall Outlet Retail Convention found a wealth to do at the meeting in Orlando, Sept. 12-14, beginning with a golf tournament, four workshops, a fashion show and the presentation of the ORCA awards.

Largest Outlets
All but one of the 20 largest outlet centers in the U.S. in 2005 is under 500,000 sf, a factoid that’s interesting to GLA numbers-crunchers who remember that four years ago the 20 largest centers included seven projects under the half-million mark. Leading the pack is Prime Outlets-Orlando, with 937,000 sf.

Digging In: Mercedes, Texas
Chelsea Property Group officially turns the turf for its outlet project in Mercedes, Texas, where it plans to open an outlet center in fall 2006. Lots of local and area celebrities turn out for the groundbreaking event.