Chicago’s Magnificent Mile sees new stores, signs of a comeback

Well, how about some shopping? We all love that. In the post-pandemic era of online shopping, Chicago's Magnificent Mile has certainly seen better days, but business could be turning around. Yeah, this is some good news. The stretch along Michigan Avenue has recently seen a bunch of new store openings and several more are expected in the months ahead. Joining us now is President and CEO of the Magnificent Mile Association, Kimberly Bares. Thank you so much, Kimberly, for joining us this morning. Good morning. It's great to be here with you. I'm happy that we're talking about some positive news because for a while there, you would drive down certain parts of the city and you'd be like, man, I've never seen it this bare. No pun intended. What does occupancy look like now compared to just last year? Oh, occupancy has grown by leaps and bounds. And I would say one of the one of the things that we want to make sure people realize is that, you know, just like musicians and other performers, there is no such thing as an overnight success. So these projects have been years in the making, and very happily we're seeing the fruits of all of our labor finally coming to pass. Kimberly, tell us about the renovation plans at the shops at Northbridge and Water Tower Place. Well, we've got three big projects, so I'll throw another one into the mix. Water Tower Place has, again, spent years thinking about how to reposition itself and how much space to put for retail versus other uses. As you opened up and talked about our shopping patterns post-pandemic, we're paying attention to that. And that's why you're seeing a lot of different kinds of uses come onto Michigan Avenue. But Water Tower Place, that's a $170 million investment. Then you asked about shops at Northbridge, another $40 million investment with some very, very exciting and surprising art elements that will be on the facade right at Nordstrom. And then the third project that I would throw in the mix is 360 Chicago. It bought another floor, let's just call it another floor, at the 875 North Michigan Avenue building, formerly known as the John Hancock. It's creating a two-story observation deck, and that's a $65 to $70 million investment. So a lot of money being spent here on Michigan Avenue with property owners repositioning, repurposing, and bringing new energy into those buildings. I want you to talk about some of the attractions that have come onto Michigan Avenue. For example, kind of sort of on Michigan Avenue, you have the Ice Cream Museum, for example. And initially when those places were showing up, I was like, well, what's the big deal? until you go down, you know, you're down here on a weekend and you see the activity and people leaving from places like that to shop. Talk about, you know, what those attractions like that do for the Mag Mile. Well, again, it represents the ability of retailers to match what we as humans want when we're out and about. The experience has become so much more important to us. the ability to connect with people while we're out. And so the Museum of Ice Cream, now you say it's just off Michigan Avenue. I want to remind folks, we have a whole district and our members aren't limited to Michigan Avenue. So we are very pro-Chicago, pro-Chicagoland. But the Museum of Ice Cream, the Harry Potter store, the Candy Hall of Fame that will be coming at 830 North Michigan Avenue, the hand in the eye. So these are all examples of that experiential retail or experiential restaurant format that we as consumers have said we're interested in spending time with our loved ones or our friends, even our colleagues and co-workers. The number of business outings that we've seen at these places has skyrocketed. There are still lines for the Hello Kitty Cafe. Jelly Cat still has lines, Uniqlo. that, and even Uniqlo was brilliant when they came in. Oh, there you go, you've got Hello Kitty right there. But when Uniqlo came in, they focused on some artist collaborations. You can walk into the Uniqlo store here and get merchandise you can't find anywhere else in the world. And that's not new. Looking back at Nutella, the Nutella store, you can walk in there and walk out with your own personalized jar of Nutella. So those kinds of things speak to what we as consumers are looking for. Hey, I got to ask about the elephant in the room, and that is crime. I used to shop quite a bit along Michigan Avenue at Forever 21, not necessarily Burberry. But I remember Burberry was broken into at least seven times, and we'd be like, Burberry again? I mean, I remember the graffiti, the broken windows, the vacancies. How are businesses coping with crime now? Well, very happily. I mean, you mentioned Forever 21. I don't remember when that left, but let's call it seven, ten years ago, something like that. And certainly we had our challenges, but we at the association, with the support of the special service area that we have and hopefully the new business improvement district that will go into place in January, we've put exceptional resources toward making sure that people are are welcome and doing everything we can to ensure that they're safe now that's primarily the job of the Chicago Police Department we've got support from the sheriff's office we ourselves have a former commander of the Chicago Police Department on our team he's our safety and security advisor and it's it's an all hands on deck but i i'm really happy to to have the question frankly because if you're asking about the smash and grabs or crash and grabs, you haven't heard about them lately. I mean, they're exceptionally rare. That doesn't mean that anything or everything is perfect, but our numbers are absolutely going in the right direction. We're really proud of the success that we've had in the partnerships that run so deeply here at the association with the Chicago Police Department and the Sheriff's Office. No, you brought up a good point. I was down here last weekend and I saw police. I didn't question my safety in that moment because I saw security, I saw police. And so I was like, man, this feels like a different version of what people portray sometimes Chicago to be. And frankly, I was like, I see why everybody's coming downtown. I did. I said that out loud to myself and to my friend who I was with as well. Kimberly, thank you so much for your time. I appreciate you coming on. My pleasure. Thanks so much for the opportunity to have the conversation.