As a kid growing up in the Curry Ford West neighborhood, Michael Weinberg used to ride his bike to the Dover Shores Shopping Center for a cookie or ice cream cone at Charlie’s Bakery & Creamery.
“I’ve been eating gingerbread men at Charlie’s since I was five or six years old,” he told GrowthSpotter.
So when an out-of-state investment firm reached out with a joint venture offer to buy the legacy property in an off-market deal, he was struck with a wave of nostalgia. As a principal at Duvalla Investments, he also recognized a great retail asset in a Main Street corridor where values were on the upswing.
Duvalla Investments and Wildpine Capital partnered to acquire the Dover Shores shopping center earlier this year for $7.5 million. It was the first time the property had changed hands in almost 60 years. (Courtesy of Colliers)
So Duvalla partnered with Charlotte-based Wildpine Capital in April to purchase the shopping center from the original owner who built it in 1957. They paid $7.5 million for the plaza, which contains over 53,000 square feet of leasable space and legacy tenants who had served the neighborhood for generations.
It’s Duvalla’s second retail center asset and Wildpine’s fifth.
“We sourced it off-market, like we do all of our assets,” Wildpine Partner Wood Penn said. He saw the property as a neighborhood center with strong fundamentals that was in need of “some intensive management” and reinvestment.
So they immediately put on a new roof, painted the exterior and repaved the parking lot. They ordered new lights and are designing a signage package to modernize the center.
“We hit the ground running for sure,” Weinberg said. “There was no delaying, right? So when we bought it, it was full speed.”
The new owners immediately replaced the roof, painted the exterior and repaved the parking lot. They have ordered new lights and designed a more modern sign package. (Courtesy of Colliers)
One thing they didn’t count on was Clemons Produce, which had anchored the center for 35 years, closing within a few months of the sale. That’s when Weinberg turned to another kid from the neighborhood for help.
Alexie Fonseca and the retail team at Colliers are actively marketing the newly renovated property with a focus on landing a new anchor that can fill the 7,500-square-foot space formerly occupied by Clemons. They have the potential to expand it to 11,555 square feet if they combine it with the adjacent storefront.
“It’s fun because we all grew up in this area,” Fonseca said. “I grew up going to Clemons Produce. I grew up going to Charlie’s Bakery. And so, it is very nostalgic to be on this property and to see.
And my point in saying that was that it’s a very established community. It’s been around a long time, but it’s in this transition and growth period right now, where you’re starting to see new movement into these areas.”
Fonseca said it was important to resign “sweetheart tenants” like Charlie’s, Johnny’s Diner and The Band Room, that have been at Dover Shores for decades. They’re looking for more health and wellness retail users, boutique fitness — like a Pilates studio — and medical or dental users. And she’s scouring the state to find another specialty grocer that’s new-to-market or a fitness user that will drive customer traffic to the center and kick-start the rest of the leasing plan.
A handful of legacy tenants, like Johnny’s Diner and Charlie’s Bakery & Creamery, signed new leases. Clemons Produce closed in August, while other tenants are on short-term leases. (Courtesy of Colliers)
“The big thing here is is with the anchor,” Weinberg said. “I mean that’s what’s going to drive the the center and really create the new merchandising mix that Alexie will sort of lead in finding, you know, who’s who and what’s what there. And so, to me, that’s the kind of the catalyst or the fulcrum point here for what happens for the center.”
Fonseca also engaged Curry Ford West Main Street Director Stephanie Ziglar to schedule community events at the center and assist tenants in applying for facade grants and funding to help with interior build-out costs.
“We’re thrilled to see new life brought into existing structures.That is is our jam,” Ziglar said. “So, we would prefer things were not demolished, and we would prefer to see new life brought into it with either adaptive reuse or a revitalization like they’re doing in that building.”
Ziglar has also shared feedback on the leasing strategy. “They are actively working to bring in something that is a smaller chain or more of a unique mom-and-pop, which I appreciate tremendously,” she said. “And they’ve been very open to our feedback and what we thought would be great and what we thought might be kind of a buzzkill.”
Have a tip about Central Florida development? Contact me at lkinsler@GrowthSpotter.com or (407) 420-6261. Follow GrowthSpotter on Facebook and LinkedIn.