The Great Clips Real Estate team joined more than 35,000 close friends in retailing and the shopping center industry this year at International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) annual RECon convention in Las Vegas. The RECon convention is the largest convention of the year in the shopping center industry and is attended by major retailers, landlords and developers. Great Clips has been present at the convention for the past 23 years.
In addition to talking with the hundreds of landlords, developers and brokers in the Great Clips booth, the Great Clips Real Estate Managers and executives attended approximately 300 landlord-focused meetings in the Las Vegas convention halls. All of these meetings are designed to do two things: flush out potential sites for us to consider, and secure those sites before another retailer can do so.
The 2014 ICSC RECon convention provided many highlights:
New development is down, while demand is rising, therefore resulting in higher rents and more control for landlords since the recession
We see new development on the rise possibly starting in 2015-16
Grocers are reluctant to open new locations due to lack of consistent single family housing growth
Grocers in the South-Central region of the U.S. are holding strong
There is increased competition for small spaces with the surge of fast-casual food restaurants and small retailers
The retail real estate community is buzzing about Great Clips’ 291 signed leases in 2013. As we’re on track to sign more than 300 leases this year, we owe a great deal to the strong relationships we have with our ICSC partners: landlords, developers, brokers and vendors.