urbanSTL

Even before Target signed on the dotted line, Heimburger and retail brokers saw a turning point for Midtown with the $300 million mixed-use City Foundry STL development, which opened St. Louis’ first food hall in August. Prior to the Nov. 10 opening in City Foundry of a new flagship grocery store for Fresh Thyme Market, Midtown had no grocery stores.  Developers plan to bring even more entertainment choices to Midtown as part of 180,000-square-foot The Armory development and the ongoing buildout of City Foundry, where construction has started on the two anchor tenants, mini golf restaurant Puttshack and dine-in cinema Alamo Drafthouse. 

Patrick Willett, a broker with Pace Properties who is working to bring unique or new-to-St. Louis retailers to City Foundry, said it can be difficult to convince national retailers to be trailblazers in the central corridor. Ikea and City Foundry started to overpower those concerns, but Willett said an “iconic” retail brand like Target will serve as a beacon for other retailers looking to locate in St. Louis for the first time.  “Once they get to town and feel the momentum, it becomes a whole lot easier, but you’ve got to get over the hurdles,” Willett said. “When we brought Ikea into Missouri and into the city limits, that was the beginning of credible retail happening in the Midtown area. And now you have Target and Fresh Thyme and Puttshack and Alamo Drafthouse — we’re really starting to build some incredible momentum.”

Spector is on a similar hunt for the retailers that will surround the new Target or future developments around The Edwin. That search got much easier by signing Target, which he called “every retailer’s best co-tenant.” He also credits the new $550 million SSM Health Saint Louis University Hospital, Pier’s existing new apartments already built in Steelcote Square, and the boutique retail experience in the Central West End as key lures for the Target.  A second St. Louis-area Topgolf location could also be coming to SLU-owned land at the northwest corner of South Compton and Chouteau avenues , just a few blocks east of The Edwin. 

“There’s a lot of things that got Target to this point, but Target is going to help us get to that next step after that,” Spector said. “What this can do to an area is so much greater than what people realize. This will be very, very good for the area and the retail market in general.”
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Heimburger said the university is in talks with several large national developers about “transformational opportunities” that could open near campus, though he declined to provide details at this time.