If the retail strategy for the $300 million-plus remodel of Del Amo Fashion Center wasn’t clear enough already, the clues are everywhere for sophisticated fashionistas and gourmets alike.
The mall wants your business — just in time for the holiday season.
When Del Amo opens a sparkling new Nordstrom and its adjacent two-story, high-end fashion wing at 10 a.m. Friday, dozens of apparel and accessory stores await curious South Bay consumers.
• Photos: Del Amo Fashion Center
But just one slice of the stores and restaurants coming to Del Amo in the coming weeks — Uniqlo, Kate Spade, Swarovski, Hugo Boss, Lulemon Athletica, Ben Bridge/Rolex, Vince Camuto, Z Gallerie and Din Tai Fung — reveals the bigger picture.
All have locations at either Costa Mesa’s South Coast Plaza or Newport Beach’s Fashion Island, two high-end Orange County malls just minutes apart that work in tandem to draw traffic from wealthy South Bay consumers.
The strategy to provide some of the same shopping options to South Bay consumers closer to home is a clear attempt by Del Amo Fashion Center owner Simon Property Group to reduce the amount of leakage from the local retail market.
But will it work?
Irvine-based marketing expert Greg Stoffel has his doubts.
Can Del Amo compete?
Despite some similarities, Del Amo is simply not in the same league as its pair of retail brethren to the south that work in effective tandem, he said.
“A lot of shopping centers would like to emulate what South Coast Plaza does, but there’s a bit of difference between trying to add some stores that are similar to South Coast Plaza, it’s another to re-create that shopping environment,” Stoffel said.
“Having the (new) fashion wing at Del Amo is one thing, but there’s so much of Del Amo that would be completely unappealing to a South Coast Plaza customer.
“I think they’ll convert some of the trips that might attribute to South Coast Plaza, but you’re adding a Nordstrom to a Sears, JCPenney, T.J. Maxx-center,” he added. “I really don’t think it’s going to increase their sales that much. At the end of the day, it’s not just Nordstrom, it’s what’s bundled around them in terms of other tenants.”
To make his point, Stoffel ticks off retailers with outlets at South Coast Plaza, but not Del Amo, including Giorgio Armani, Jimmy Choo, John Varvatos and Saks Fifth Avenue.
Indeed, South Coast Plaza is a luxury shopping center — Beverly Hills in a mall, one retail analyst said in wry summation — while Del Amo is a middle-market retail center trying to upgrade from the homogeneous enclosed malls frantically trying to differentiate themselves from the competition in overmalled America.
The numbers back that up.
South Coast Plaza’s 2.7 million square feet of shopping space generates about $1.7 billion in sales annually, injecting $17 million a year into Costa Mesa’s coffers, said Gary Armstrong, the city’s economic development director.
In comparison, 144-acre Del Amo generated about $3.6 million in sales tax revenues to the city of Torrance in the most recent fiscal year, a figure expected to rise — although no one is sure exactly how much — once Del Amo bulks up to 2.7 million square feet.
The addition of the 138,000-square-foot Nordstrom and the 400,000 square feet of retail in the two-story fashion wing will make it the same size as South Coast Plaza in terms of retail space. About 60 percent of the stores there are expected to open their doors Friday.
When fully open, Del Amo will become the largest shopping center in the western U.S. and fifth largest mall in the nation, according to Simon Property Group officials.
But, again, size is where the similarity ends.
Destinations draw shoppers
“What these centers are providing is the experience,” Armstrong said. “It’s not just finding a product. It’s the tremendous dining opportunities within South Coast Plaza.
“It’s the number of very, very high-end stores, and the improvements they do are spectacular: the stone, flooring, the lighting is all absolutely top-notch and comes from some of the finest designers in Europe,” he added. “They do enjoy quite a bit of foreign visitation — Middle Eastern and Chinese tourists. It’s really a destination in itself.”
While wealthy sheiks and Chinese entrepreneurs are jetting into nearby John Wayne Airport, Del Amo similarly benefits from Los Angeles International Airport visitors.
But the type of consumer is quite different.
Del Amo sees 200 international travelers a night, among them French, German and Dutch flight crews staying in relatively inexpensive contract lodging at the adjacent Torrance Marriott.
Lufthansa flight attendant Marisa Schlieckau of Frankfurt bustled into the hotel Friday carrying plastic shopping bags from H&M and discount stores Marshall’s and T.J Maxx.
“It’s very convenient to just step out of the hotel and walk to the mall,” she said. “There are many things that are cheaper here than in Germany. I like to do clothes shopping here.”
Soon it will be even more convenient.
Marriott lodgers soon will be able to step out of the garden exit and entrance to the hotel on Fashion Way and find themselves directly across the street from Nordstrom’s front door.
What was once the back end of the mall — with a low-end Montgomery Ward and chronically empty sunken parking lot used for things like displays of military vehicles on Armed Forces Day — is now the focus of the shopping center.
Adjacent to Nordstrom is a new 1,951-space parking garage equipped with technology that will make parking easier and faster. It includes pedestrian walkways to Nordstrom on three of its four levels for convenient access.
The city’s largest hotel is capitalizing.
“Our building was just repainted to blend in with the Nordstrom colors across the street,” General Manager Kandee Anderson said. “It has a similar tone and feel and elegant colors. We tried to make sure we were in harmony with the Nordstrom palette.”
Up next year is a $3.5 million lobby project, followed by room improvements.
Del Amo is trying to shake off its dingy image as a cluttered, hard-to-navigate mall with new soaring glass windows, bright skylights, living green walls and sleek exterior and interior finishes.
Its milelong boundary along Hawthorne Boulevard, regarded as one of the most prestigious retail stretches in Southern California, also has received a significant landscaping upgrade.
Those are the sort of artful touches needed if it is to lure the sort of customers — three South Bay ZIP codes are among the top 10 most affluent in the county, Simon officials note — that made South Coast Plaza one of the nation’s most successful shopping centers. Its sales per square foot are roughly double that of most other run-of-the-mill walls.
Will local shoppers switch?
Paula Bold, a Palos Verdes Estates resident for nearly 40 years, said she makes nine or 10 trips a year to South Coast Plaza to shop, but will give the revamped Del Amo a chance.
Parking in Beverly Hills is a hassle, and she prefers the larger Nordstrom at South Coast Plaza as well as the Macy’s there to those in the South Bay.
“The Nordstrom is nicer and, at our Macy’s, it’s hard to find anyone to help you,” Bold said. “There are always lines, whereas at South Coast Plaza, there’s more help. I hope that changes. I can see they’re trying to make improvements.
“I’m excited about it, and I just hope it turns out to be a good place for shopping locally.”
Ben Gallegos, a 25-year-old Torrance resident who frequents malls at least twice a week in search of trendy shoes and clothes, regularly makes the 45-minute drive to South Coast Plaza.
“People don’t really know what Torrance is,” he said. “Del Amo used to be the biggest mall in America, but now it’ll bring more people to the South Bay.
“And who doesn’t like new? I know we’ll have better selection, so this will be the mall I come to from now on.”
Jonathan Sadowsky, 44, a Santa Monica entrepreneur who owns the right to open three 18/8 Fine Men’s Salons in the South Bay, likes to hear comments like that; his first with a “manly atmosphere” will be adjacent to Nordstrom at Del Amo.
The salons feature lounges where guys can suck back a brew while watching sports on a giant television and semi-private grooming areas where they can get haircuts starting at $50.
He would not have opened his doors in the old Del Amo, Sadowsky said, even though he sees a gap in the marketplace for his niche services.
“At the moment the only real choice is to go to a women’s salon,” he said. “They don’t have a place to go that can be seen as a sophisticated male sanctuary and get their grooming needs done in a place that’s just for men.
“Hopefully, (the mall) will attract the right demographic,” he added. “I look at it like if someone can afford to shop at Nordstrom, they can afford one of my haircuts.”
Staff writers Megan Barnes and Nereida Moreno contributed to this article.
