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| The 2.4 million square-foot expansion of Carousel Center mall is now officially Destiny USA, sixth largest mall in America. |
Syracuse, NY -- It is what it is. And what it is now is Destiny USA.
You may still call it Carousel Center, a name that has stuck to the super-regional mall since its opening in 1990.
But today the property’s owners, an arm of Syracuse-based Pyramid Cos., are rechristening the entire 2.4-million-square-foot property — both the old mall and its expansion.
Gone is Carousel Center. The name on the mall, in the mall, on the road around the mall and on every piece of marketing material is Destiny USA.
While Destiny is far short of the destination Pyramid’s dreamers once proposed — the largest retail and entertainment complex in the nation — they did create something that is, in size, the sixth-largest mall in America. Pyramid says it will be the second most-visited mall in the nation.
When complete, possibly by early 2013, it will have approximately 264 stores, restaurants and entertainment venues, which will employ 5,000 people.
Despite the project’s significant backpedaling from its grandiose vision, retail industry insiders and tenants say the Destiny USA we’re getting is a model for success in the post-economic downturn shopping environment
“For malls today, they’ve been looking at how they can reinvent themselves,” said Daniel Butler, vice president of retail operations for the trade group National Retail Federation. “They have to make themselves unique and special. And that’s what I think Destiny USA does.
“They certainly have a broad offering of retailers, but they’ve also created an environment where people can have an experience while they’re shopping and can spend time there. They can shop, they can play, they can rest, they can play on their tablet or all kinds of things over the course of a time spent in that development.”
The blending of Carousel old into Destiny new means longtime tenants of Carousel must readjust to a new name and new marketing — and maybe even a new look.
David Lisseno, who owns the Subway stand in the food court area, just finished a top-to-bottom refurbishing of his stand.
“It’s a bright and fresh-looking decor for our customers, and timed for the reinvention of the mall, the new face of the mall we are all confident with,” Lisseno said.
The older part of the mall was refreshed with a new paint scheme, new overhead signs and digital directories to blend itself into the expansion, mall executives said.
In a June 20 letter addressed to the thousands of people who work in Carousel, Rob Schoeneck, the mall’s general manager, said the rebranding “marks a significant turning point” for visitors to the center.
“Because of the unique mix of entertainment, retail and dining, Destiny USA will have an expanded trade area that will draw travelers and tourists from beyond our region,” wrote Schoeneck. “We will also deliver a fully integrated complex which is slated to be the sixth largest in the country according to size and the second most visited shopping center in the country.”
Since its inception in 2005, the started, stopped and restarted expansion that would create Destiny USA cost $600 million, said David Aitken, a Destiny executive.
Annual projected sales tax revenues from the entire project are estimated to be $300 million, said Aitken, including the additional $12 million generated by the new tenant mix.
Jesse Tron, speaking for the trade group International Council of Shopping Center, said the trend in mall-building today is mall rebuilding, or malls reinventing themselves with makeovers.
“I can tell you (regarding Destiny), dining and entertainment definitely lines up with everything we’re seeing (at mall remodels),” Tron said. “It (entertainment and food) has always been, to an extent, a focal point, but coming out of the recession, even more so.
“Malls have to be more than a channel for the distribution of goods. It’s dining and dining other than food court. And traditionally, a lot of mall-based entertainment was built around movie theaters, but today, other forms of entertainment are becoming far more popular.”
Tron said that the Carousel expansion — Destiny USA — may be one of the largest mall “remodels” in the United States.
“That’s a really large renovation project,” said Tron.
Compared side-by-side, the expansion reflects the trend away from the original vision the nearly 22-year-old Carousel Center side was created for.
The original mall had s constricted “common area” that pushed shopper flow, with limited seating areas and open spaces to engage in conversation.
The expansion, especially the area named The Canyon, is quite the opposite: It’s a town-square-like open area with upscale and casual dining areas that have patios. Natural light pours in from skylights and a window wall. Seating areas abound, from the walls surrounding the architectural trees and grasses to new carpeted, soft seating areas.
The retail and dining lineup also reflects changing times.
Twenty-five years ago, outlet centers were evolving as competitors to malls and were not yet abundant as they are today. Now, retailers are pushing some of those outlets into traditional malls, competing with mid-level and luxury department stores that may carry the same wares.
That includes high-end outlets.
“It used to be,” said Butler of the National Retail Federation, “25, 30 years ago, if you were a department store customer, you didn’t shop specialty stores. And if you were a discount shopper, you didn’t shop in department stores. Over the last three decades, that has evolved and changed. So someone who shops at an outlet might also shop at Walmart. And they do.
“Today’s consumer is looking for the right product at the right price and the right features. And also convenience and efficiency are more important to today’s consumer than ever before.”
With more double-income homes now than in the late 1980s, said Butler, some people have cash to shop with but are short on time.
“So when they shop, they tend to spend more and they’ve got to make the most of their time,” said Butler. “So retailers and mall developers know you’re probably not coming in quite as often as a shopper used to. So they have to make sure they have a great experience.
“Over the last few years, you’ve heard store-design firms talking about experiential design. It’s all about how do you create the experience that people want to have and make the most of the time they have, so if you only have five minutes in their store, you have a great five minutes.”
“This goes back to how malls are reinventing themselves to be relevant in today’s economy. The tenant mix is different. It starts and ends with the consumer. They’re driving this redevelopment.
Some of the shoppers Destiny is taking direct aim are Canadians making Destiny a destination.
Destiny’s Aitken said 43 percent of the mall’s shoppers come from outside Onondaga County and roughly 12 percent of the mall’s 30 million visitors a year come from Canada. Destiny is marketing itself in a swath of Ontario, Canada, south of Ottawa bordering the St. Lawrence Seaway, a trade area unveiled by an Oxford Economics report from 2011.
“As you know, we have a two-decade track record of welcoming Canadian shoppers to the facility,” said Aitken. “We are working hard to increase visitation from our neighbors to the north on many levels.”
It’s been that way — often in waves — since the mall opened, but more so now, as Canadians can spend more in the U.S. than ever before without paying duty fees on return to their country.
Carousel has always been a key stop, surveys and interviews with retailers, restaurants, shoppers and hotel owners have noted. Then they often hit Waterloo Premium Outlets, they say.
Destiny executives say the high-end and luxury outlets, fine dining and more in the expanded mall may make that Canadian traffic of nearly a half-million visitors a year grow.
“These visitors bring their purchasing dollars to Syracuse and Onondaga County and leave sales tax revenue and jobs behind,” said Aitken. “These imported dollars are just as important to the local economy as dollars earned through manufacturing.”
But there’s also a Canadian competitor looming on the horizon: U.S.-based Simon Property Group has teamed with a Canadian partner to build Toronto Premium Outlets, an upscale outlet center near Toronto designed, its owners say, in part to keep Canadian outlet shoppers home — and not in the U.S. and Destiny.
Its scheduled to open some time in 2013, but Aitken said Destiny executives are unconcerned.
“We believe our unique mix of tenants and location here will build our successful draw of Canadian traffic,” said Aitken.
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