6. EDSR 10-13-2008 - Laserfiche WebLink

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CONTINUED: Retailers Say Developers Share Blame for PullBack in New Store Openings (lacking of the highest ticket items) in a New Jersey warehouse and expects the first store open in Glendale, CA this fall. While Tiffany's plans for 5-7 new full-line stores annually, it expects to open 3-5 small format stores, which means it would take 8-10 years for the retailer to achieve its U.S. goal. Fernandez said of the small format store, "The locations we'll be able to enter are either streets or malls that we could never have justified adding a full line store to. Financially, the store has a very low breakeven level, extremely low inventory investment and also the highest margin jewelry. There's a lot of affluent markets, some of them even within markets we're in now, where customers are saying they'd like to have Tiffany's 20-30 minutes away as opposed to 1-2 hours away, so convenience is part of the rationale as well." Adding these stores should further grow Tiffany's sales productivity -- it has already increased from $1,700 sales per gross square foot in 1007 to $2,700 in 2007. Dollar Tree has hope beyond $1 in its Deal$ stores. The company acquired 138 of the stores from Supervalu in 2006 to test a store where the price point is raised to $5 or less. It now expects to open 22- 24 Deal$ in the coming 12 months, primarily in new markets. "We think the Deal$ model will allow us to do higher sales volume per store, higher leverage on fixed costs and the opportunity to go into some of the more expensive real estate around these urban centers in the Northeast or California, etc. It expands the growth runway for our customers." Wal-Mart president and CEO, Lee Scott said the company is going to take opportunities to expand that are presenting themselves now because of the weakened economy, "With prices on fuel and food going up, we now are having an increased number of communities contacting us and asking us to build a Wal-Mart store in their town or state and some of those are the very towns or states you would have read about historically that are not enchanted by a beautiful Wal-Mart store." And as Wal-Mart is opening three "Marketside" small-format grocery stores this year in Phoenix, a format many say is designed to combat Tesco's Fresh & Easy, the retailer still has more ideas. As it adapts its retailing strategy to international markets, it is inspired for ideas in the U.S. "I think there's lots of opportunity for formats in the U.S A store that might remind you of a Bodega store is clearly possible." (A Bodega is a small grocery store typically found in Spanish-speaking neighborhoods.) (Editor's Note: To keep up on happenings and trends in retail real estate, subscribe to Costar's Retail News Roundup, a weekly column covering retailer expansions and new concepts, store closings, bankruptcies, cutbacks, acquisition, mergers, sales. new shopping centers, personnel changes, and sustainability. Follow this link for access to back issues of the roundup. In addition to appearing every week in the national news and "> retail news sections of our web site, you may also receive the Retail News Roundup for free via email by requesting to be added to the distribution list by contacting senior editor, Sasha Pardy at spardy@CoStar.com Also, click here to subscribe to Costar's dedicated Retail RSS Feed. (c) 2008 Costar Realty Information, Inc. All rights reserved.