Retailers recruited from Mainland
By Dan Nakaso
Advertiser Staff Writer
The owner of the Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center hopes to lock up agreements soon with one or two Mainland retailers that could indirectly help revive major renovation plans for the center in the heart of Waikiki.
Deborah Booker • The Honolulu Advertiser
"The plan's in flux right now but it's a plan that will go forth," said Charlian Wright, corporate marketing director for Pauahi Management Corp., the for-profit arm of Kamehameha Schools that operates the shopping center.
Plans to renovate the Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center are "in flux" but will "go forth," according to the owners of the Waikiki complex. Mainland retailers are being sought to take over the space to be vacated by McInerny.
Pauahi Management selected Retail Strategies Inc. as leasing agent for the shopping center. Retail Strategies officials spent most of last week at the International Council of Shopping Centers conference in Las Vegas looking for potential Mainland retailers.
The retailers would take over space that will be vacated by retailer McInerny, one of the center's original tenants. McInerny earlier this year announced it was closing its largest store — 35,000 square feet — at the center, as well as two others in Waikiki, as part of a move to remain viable in the tough resort retail market.
Officials declined to name the potential Mainland retailers, who would join some 140 other tenants and small concessions in the shopping center. But the new retailers would most likely cater to Mainland tourists and represent the changing face of Waikiki since the Sept. 11 attacks caused a decline in the number of high-spending Japanese visitors.
Wright described the Mainland retailers as "new to Hawai'i, who haven't been overexposed."
Randy Yeager, president and chief executive of Retail Strategies, said there was a lot of interest in the Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center in Las Vegas.
"During the time of the Japanese bubble, there were very few vacancies (at the center)," he said. "Now many of the more westbound-oriented U.S. Mainland brands are feeling there may be some opportunities to get in."
Wright said the center could reach lease agreements and have renovation plans in place by the end of the year. But reconstruction would take longer. "That won't be for a while," she said.
Pauahi Management was planning a $25 million renovation for the shopping center but put the plans on hold after Sept. 11.
"The shopping center's 20 years old, trends have changed, shopping patterns have chang-ed," Wright said. "We wanted to make sure we accommodated the needs of our visitors with different sorts of attractions."
Wright would not disclose the original features of the renovation. But any new ideas would probably take into account the needs of the major retailers that sign on for the McInerny space.
"If the center gets redesigned and opened up and there's some freshness to it, it might attract some new tenants," Yeager said. "But if the plans are already set in stone, it may limit a major retailer to make their own plans."
Reach Dan Nakaso at dnakaso@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8085.
