Eclectic mix buoys Carytown merchants

As organizers prepare the glass ball that rises over the Byrd Theatre to ring in 2009, Carytown merchants wonder what the new year will bring.

The mostly locally owned retailers faced the same tribulations national chains experienced as consumers tightened their wallets this year.

But merchants in this Richmond retail district exude a sense of optimism. Many retail experts and retailers believe the features that make the area a one-of-a-kind shopping destination, will help it get through difficult economic times.

Carytown will always be viable because it offers shoppers something that's hard to find in other places, said Leslie Fellows, owner of culinary specialty store Compleat Gourmet.

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"Unique" comes up a lot when people refer to the nine-block shopping district on West Cary Street near the Fan District.

"What you have here you can't find anywhere else," Diane Swift said during a shopping excursion before Christmas. "That's why we make the drive."

Swift and friend Debbie Olson point out that they have plenty of shopping opportunities near their homes in western Henrico County. But they come to Carytown for one day of shopping and dining every holiday season and at least a few Saturdays each year.

Carytown's store mix draws them.

"It's nice to find a place where mostly every store is one-of-a-kind," Olson said. "You can find something hip, or something out of the ordinary. It's unique."

Both women said they would probably avoid shopping in Carytown if the area was lined with national chains.

Real estate brokers, shop owners and city officials say Carytown's eclectic mix of shops and restaurants is the reason the corridor has thrived and is its advantage during difficult times.

"There is a nice mix of stores that that group [of merchants] has put together and they are so good at supporting each other," said E. Martin Jewell, the city councilman representing the 5th District, which cuts through Carytown.

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Carytown, which got its moniker from merchants in 1974, is a self-described "mile of style" with such shops as A Bun in the Oven, Pink, Plan 9, World of Mirth, Lex's of Carytown and Atomic Books. The area also sports New York Deli, Can Can Brasserie and Galaxy Diner.

That mix, merchants say, draws an eclectic group of customers from the Fan, the outlying suburbs and from out of town.

No exact figures are available on sales Carytown generates, but Jewell said it's a substantial portion of retail sales in the city.

The Virginia Department of Taxation reports that retail sales in Richmond, excluding restaurants and bars, for the first nine months of 2008 were down almost $10 million from $57.1 million in the same period last year.

Raylene Wilkinson, owner of Raylene's Pennyrich and president of the Carytown Merchants Association, said the area is ringing up fewer sales just like retailers elsewhere in the country.

"We're all trying to be optimistic, but our sales are definitely down," she said.

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Fellows, who opened Compleat Gourmet in the early 1970s, said the area has weathered some hard times previously. In 2003, for example, Short Pump Town Center and Stony Point Fashion Park opened within weeks of each other.

"Before those two malls, it was different," she said. "They spread the pie out for everybody."

Fellows is concerned that it will become increasingly difficult to attract customers as retail space grows in the region.

"You have so many places now," she said. "All of those [developments] have an impact on every one of us [because] you have umpteen places to spend money."

More worrisome to Carytown's future, Fellows said, is rent costs. She said several potential retail tenants have decided against opening shops near her store because it was too expensive.

Carytown landlords need to "have rents more in line with what the area can support," she said.

Wilkinson agrees.

"With the economic times we have, I think the landlords have to look at whether they want to continue to have the businesses in their buildings or if they're going to have an empty store," she said. "I think they're going to have to work with us in order to have Carytown continue to be what it is."

Rob Black, vice president and director of retail services at real estate broker CB Richard Ellis, said concern over rising rents is not uncommon.

"Carytown, for a lot of years, had some pretty affordable options," he said. But that changed as the area became more popular and landlords wanted a premium for their spaces.

Still, Black said, high rents are a matter of perspective.

Retail rents in the Short Pump area are in the low $30-per-squarefoot range while in Carytown they remain in the high teens or low $20s.

As vacancy rates creep up, though, landlords will have to work on terms, he said.

A recent count of Carytown buildings found that roughly 26 of the 164, or nearly 16 percent, were empty.

According to Reis, a New York-based firm that analyzes real estate trends, the national vacancy rate at shopping centers is forecast to be about 9.1 percent at the end of this year. Reis expects that to jump to 9.9 percent by the end of 2009 and to 10.3 percent in 2010.

It is difficult to judge Carytown by those figures because the shopping district isn't precisely like a shopping center.

Whatever might happen with rents, added competition or a bad economy, Black said the West Cary Street district will continue to perform well.

"What's in Carytown you won't find anywhere else. . . . If there is something that is offbeat and quirky, a lot of times it ends up there."
Contact Louis Llovio at (804) 649-6348 or .

Staff writer Chris Young and Bloomberg News contributed to this report.