Easton Town Center Columbus, Ohio Project Type: Commercial/Industrial Case No: C030018 Year: 2000 SUMMARY A 750,000-square-foot, mixed-use retail/entertainment complex located about eight miles from the Columbus, Ohio, central business district (CBD) but within city limits and within the I-270 beltway. Easton Town Center (www.Eastontowncenter.Com) is a destination project with a "Main Street" that includes restaurants, a brew pub, a comedy club, a book superstore, a fitness center, a home furnishings store, a cybercade, more than 50 upscale boutiques and shops, and a 30-screen Planet Movies cineplex. A centrally located "town square" completes the village theme, providing an identity for the project and a gathering spot for social activities FEATURES An updated "town square" to meet contemporary retail demand A city grid that reinforces the urban village concept Mix of open-air and enclosed retail stores in a downtown setting Easton Town Center Columbus, Ohio Project Type: Retail/Entertainment Volume 30 Number 18 October-December 2000 Case Number: C030018 PROJECT TYPE A 750,000-square-foot, mixed-use retail/entertainment complex located about eight miles from the Columbus, Ohio, central business district (CBD) but within city limits and within the I-270 beltway. Easton Town Center (www.Eastontowncenter.Com) is a destination project with a "Main Street" that includes restaurants, a brew pub, a comedy club, a book superstore, a fitness center, a home furnishings store, a cybercade, more than 50 upscale boutiques and shops, and a 30-screen Planet Movies cineplex. A centrally located "town square" completes the village theme, providing an identity for the project and a gathering spot for social activities. SPECIAL FEATURES An updated "town square" to meet contemporary retail demand A city grid that reinforces the urban village concept Mix of open-air and enclosed retail stores in a downtown setting DEVELOPMENT TEAM DEVELOPERS Steiner + Associates, Inc. 4016 Townsfair Way Suite 201 Columbus, Ohio 43219 814-414-7300 www.steiner.com The Georgetown Company 667 Madison Avenue New York, New York 10021 212-755-2323 The Limited, Inc. 3 Limited Parkway Columbus, Ohio 43216 614-479-7980 www.limited.com ARCHITECTS Development Design Group, Inc. 7 St. Paul Street Baltimore, Maryland 21202 410-962-0505 www.ddg-usa.com Meacham & Apel Architects, Inc. 6161 Riverside Drive Suite A Dublin, Ohio 43017 614-764-0407 PLANNER Cooper Robertson & Partners 311 West 43rd Street 13th Floor New York, New York 10036 212-247-1717 GENERAL DESCRIPTION Easton Town Center is a revisitation of the classic American downtown, with a central town square that serves as the focal point of the community for shopping, dining, entertainment, and socializing. In its design and construction, the 750,000-square-foot complex reflects the nostalgic application of modern retail and leisure-time concepts to a traditional urban street setting. Traditional building materials include red brick and white-painted trim, and exterior fixtures such as cast-iron lamp posts define the project’s character. Ceiling heights in enclosed areas were lowered to 13.5 feet to create an appropriate scale and increase the sense of intimacy. The development is pedestrian friendly in the more traditional town planning sense that it accommodates cars and people alike, with a grid of real streets, curbside parallel parking with meters, wide sidewalks, and numerous crosswalks and pathways. The 13 buildings on eight city blocks are not simple facades but real, three-dimensional edifices, organized in city blocks. Service areas are fully designed and integrated into each building; there is no unsightly "back of the house." A mix of indoor and outdoor activities that take place year-round is offered: winter, for example, brings holiday festivities to the town square, which, in the spring, accommodates children playing in the interactive "pop" fountain. Offices above street-level storefronts not only benefit companies that locate in Easton Town Center but also increase activity at the second-floor level and add a business component to the traffic through Easton. Easton Town Center was carefully planned and merchandised. Tenant mix was given the highest priority, while merchandising informed planning continually so that the project’s architecture and design accommodate modern retailers’ needs and consumers’ demands. A clear vision of Easton Town Center’s essence—its tenant mix, merchandising, and spirit—was retained throughout the design, development, and construction stages to current—and future—operations. Easton Town Center, which opened in July 1999, has succeeded primarily because it is a real neighborhood center. The development meets more than simple market demand for branded retail and themed entertainment on the outskirts of Columbus; it fulfills the community’s need for social interaction. Easton Town Center provides a safe, urban setting that encourages socializing while it provides a mix of uses, including retail, entertainment, restaurant, and office space. Free summer concerts on Thursdays and a Saturday morning farmers’ market are just a couple of the events enjoyed by the community. Garage parking is free of charge; revenue from street meters—in addition to any "tickets" for parking delinquencies—goes to charities. In Easton Town Center’s first year, more than 9 million people visited the project; the heavy customer traffic reportedly has produced extraordinary first-year sales of more than $400 per square foot. Several of the retail stores and restaurants are the most productive in their chain; many of these tenants are producing well in excess of $600 per square foot, making them the highest-grossing stores in the greater Columbus market. These sales levels have helped create a project income stream that is producing yields in excess of 12 percent (unleveraged) on project costs of about $120 million. DEVELOPMENT The story of Easton Town Center parallels the story of the Limited, Inc., a multiline retail chain headquartered in Columbus, Ohio. Both Easton and the Limited are results of the vision of Leslie Wexner, the founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of the Limited, Inc. In the early 1980s, building on its 18 years of constant growth, the Limited, Inc., started to operate as a venture capitalist, creating new businesses and purchasing existing specialty retailers. In this climate, Wexner formed a real estate development unit within the Limited. An early project was the 1,200-acre country club community of New Albany, just a few miles east of Easton. In 1986, Wexner started purchasing farmland centered around Morse Road in the northeast quadrant of Columbus that was within the city limits and just within the I-270 beltway. He envisioned a multiuse development of retail, office, residential, hotel, and entertainment venues, with the principal goal of establishing a business park for the Limited’s national headquarters and operations center. The land was a large infill parcel surrounded by low-density development that had been encouraged by city legislation offering a ten-year, 100 percent abatement of property taxes for all new development in the area that Wexner came to name Easton. With each purchase of a parcel, Wexner’s development team had to win zoning approval for conversion from agricultural to commercial use. By the time Wexner announced the start of construction in early 1996, the fully assembled parcels formed a contiguous 1,200 acres, an area twice the size of the local Ohio State University campus. Meanwhile, the recession of the early 1990s led to drastic corporate restructuring at the Limited, Inc. As a publicly traded company focused on maximizing shareholder value, the Limited responded by spinning off its various store brands as stand-alone businesses and by shedding non-core activities. One of the non-core businesses was Easton, of which the Limited sold 50 percent to the Georgetown Company of New York as a partner in the development. Easton and its environs continued to develop during the startup phase. Four million square feet of office space was constructed by year-end 1995, providing a local and regional presence for Chase Manhattan Mortgage Corporation, Price Waterhouse, and M/I Schottenstein Homes and world headquarters for Victoria’s Secret’s catalog distribution center and the Limited, Inc. The widening of nearby I-270 from six to 12 lanes had begun in anticipation of increased traffic. A 35-acre town center had been an integral part of the plan since Easton’s inception as a master-planned community. By 1996, the desired balance of residential, office, and retail space was sufficiently in place to justify planning the town center. The development partners began looking for outside expertise in creating a special environment for Easton. They found it in CoCoWalk, a pioneering $38 million, 145,000-square-foot, three-story retail and entertainment complex in Coconut Grove, Florida, that had opened in November 1991, attracting 35 tenants within its first six months of operation. Its developer, Constructa, had stepped in to rescue a faltering project, turning it into a great financial and critical success. Constructa’s president and project manager for CoCoWalk, Yaromir Steiner, was invited to re-create CoCoWalk’s magic in Easton. Steiner resigned from Constructa, formed his own development company, Steiner + Associates, and moved his entire operations to Columbus. Steiner + Associates shares an equity position in Easton Town Center with the Georgetown Company, the Limited, Inc., and with various private investors, one of whom is Arnold Schwarzenegger. Steiner + Associates acts as Easton Town Center’s management company, allowing the Limited to continue its gradual sell-off of non-core assets. SITE PLANNING AND DESIGN Wexner brought in Cooper Robertson & Partners to site-plan Easton, and Steiner + Associates had a prior relationship with Development Design Group. Together they formed a team to review the best of past town center designs—Country Club Plaza, in Kansas City, Missouri, and Reston Town Center, in Reston, Virginia, among others—and to extract relevant ideas, improving upon and modifying them.