With very few shopping centers scheduled to open in the U.S. in 2012, Salt Lake City's 80-store City Creek Center looms large as a beacon of the area's commercial recovery. The Salt Lake Tribune reports that businesses have begun to make their first expansions into the state, whether through building or leasing. With the time for expansion at hand, chains in the area could benefit from updated real estate portfolio management strategies to weigh their options for new locations.
“Utah is in remarkably better shape than surrounding states,” Salt Lake City-based commercial real estate broker Chris Hatch told the news source. “This is a good place to be.”
City Creek itself is a new breed of retail space. KSL News Salt Lake City reports that the space has been designed to present retail as an entertainment experience and that it will contain lavish decorations such as a fully retractable roof, a sky bridge and an indoor re-creation of the real-life City Creek, which formerly flowed nearby.
The idea of shopping as an involved experience is taking hold around the retail sector. The challenges present in maintaining complex systems may be limited by up-to date facility maintenance software.
