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Eagan outlet mall to open in mid-August AUG - 7 2014
Updated:08/05/2014 10.'41:00 AM CDT TwinCities.com
Eagan outlet mall to open in mid-August
• Jul 23:
• Eagan outlet mall announces 30 new stores
• Jun 5:
• Eagan job fair to be held for new outlet mall
• May 16:
• Going to Eagan outlet mall? You might want to leave your car at home
• Jan 23:
• New shops join planned Eagan outlet mall
• Nov 26:
• Hotel planned near new Eagan outlet mall
• Oct 2:
• Eagan outlet mall's new stores announced
Does outlet shopping mean an hour's drive to a distant interstate exit? It has for many Twin
Cities shoppers. But that's about to change.
A 100-store outlet mall will open Aug. 14 in the second-ring suburb of Eagan.
The $100 million Twin Cities Premium Outlets will be an easier trek from the Twin Cities
core, just three miles south of Bloomington's Mall of America.
Its arrival reflects trends that have transformed the outlet industry.
The drab factory outlet centers built a generation ago have been overtaken by something
more stylish that has become one of the hotter concepts in retailing.
Trends include a surge of luxury brands with their own fleet of off-price outlet stores, outlet
centers that have moved closer to urban cores and a wave of strapped consumers who sent
outlet sales growing, even during the recession.
"By the end of this year, we'll have 50 outlet
centers built in the United States since 2006,1 1011 versus just one traditional (enclosed) mall," said
"` Linda Humphers, editor of the industry
- publication Value Retail News.
'* 7, t ,-"ti' .." RETAIL SENSITIVITY
roily T
II eta� �` The changing landscape has been fed by the
decline of once-powerful regional department
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The dining area inside food court at the new Eagan stores, which used to enforce the rule that luxury
Outlet mall in Eagan on Wednesday. July 31 2014 brands shouldn't be sold at nearby outlet stores.
(Pioneer Press Ben Garvin)
"When we had Dayton Hudson ... they were really defensive about their department-store
territories," said Jim McComb, a Twin Cities retail analyst. "If somebody (with an outlet store)
tried to come close to them, they would reflect their displeasure by reducing their sales of
their merchandise line within their stores. I know Ralph Lauren was sensitive to that.
"In every major metro area, there were department stores of a similar type," McComb added.
"Then the department store industry changed. So that gave the outlet mall developers the
opportunity to move closer in on good locations."
But department stores weren't the only ones wary. So were a lot of luxury brands. They
feared selling goods at an outlet store would undercut full-priced sales -- and dent their
reputation.
"It's still an issue," said Humphers, with Value
= :,.. Retail News. "It's called retail sensitivity, and it
\tors_ ` ' `.7 basically was that the manufacturers did not want
00011 r-
► to interfere with their (full-priced) accounts,
because those accounts were much more
, important to the brand than opening an outlet
store.,,
� . But over the years, that concern has faded and a
Sale signs are organized at Tilly’.s at the new new business model has taken root.
Eagan Outlet mall in Eagan on Wednesday, July 31.
2014. (Pioneer Press Ben Garvin) That's evident in headliners coming to Eagan:
Armani, Ann Taylor, J. Crew, Coach, Michael
Kors, Vera Bradley, 7 For All Mankind, Polo Ralph Lauren and other higher-end brands.
Even the department store Saks Fifth Avenue is getting in on the action, opening a Saks Off
5th store at the Eagan outlet.
What changed?
"The brands discovered they could make a lot of money selling at outlets," McComb said.
"And they realized that they weren't selling to the same customer as their mainline business.
They were expanding their consumer footprint."
IT'S THE LABEL
Currently, the Twin Cities area boasts three major outlet malls, each roughly an hour's drive
from downtown St. Paul.
There's North Branch Outlets, located north of the Twin Cities on 1-35. There's Medford
Outlet Center, located to the south on 1-35. And there's Albertville Premium Outlets,
northwest up 1-94.
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There's also the remnants of Manufacturers Marketplace in Woodbury, a 1992-vintage outlet
mall that struggled and was later redeveloped to include a Walmart Supercenter. The
decline of that Woodbury outlet served as a warning about being near traditional malls.
"The outlet mall that was built in Woodbury suffered because they could not attract the
fashion tenants," McComb said. "They were too close to the Twin Cities. They could get the
hard-goods guys, the pots and pans, those types of tenants."
Now 22 years later, owners of the 409,000-square-foot new Eagan mall report that upscale
clothing manufacturers were eager to sign leases.
"The lease-up here has been fantastic," said Les Morris, a spokesman for mall operator
Simon, one of the Eagan mall's two owners. "We've got two or three spaces left, but we're
almost sold out in terms of available space."
Instead of relying on sheer distance to serve as a moat between full-priced stores and outlet
centers, luxury retailers now use other techniques -- such as manufacturing separate and
less-expensive lines, sold only at outlet centers.
• a` _ "It still has the label, but it may have fewer
buttons, simpler construction, maybe slightly
t 4 i lower-quality fabric -- anything they can do to
save money on it," McComb said.
Humphers also notes there is "the emergence of
better technology, which gave (brands) an ability
to see what products you had where. So you
wouldn't have the same goods in an outlet store
at the same time you had them at full price at a
A worker mops the floor inside the food court area at the
new Eagan Outlet malt in Eagan on Wednesday. July retail store."
31, 2014. (Pioneer Press.Ben Garvin)
The Eagan mall is a joint venture between
Paragon Outlet Partners, which owns 65 percent of the development, and Simon, which
owns 35 percent and will operate the mall.
If the nearby outlet center does affect sales at traditional malls here, Simon will know it. The
Indianapolis-based company also owns Southdale Center and Maplewood Mall, as well as
Albertville Premium Outlets.
Will the Eagan mall's location change how people shop at outlets, as the day trip becomes
the drop-in?
"I think probably a little bit it does," Morris, the Simon spokesman, said. "But it also changes
the frequency with which people will come to Twin Cities Outlets ... It won't be a day trip. it'll
be a weekend morning trip. They'll pop in here."
Tom Webb can be reached at 651-228-5428. Follow him at twitter.com/TomWebbMN.
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