A Denver mixed-use development is assembling a tenant list that is, almost without exception, drool worthy.
Matthew Morris Salon, Highland Tap & Burger, Sushi-Rama, Los Chingones and Corvus Coffee Roasters are among the retailers and restaurants that have opened or signed leases for ground-floor retail space in two adjacent transit-oriented apartment buildings.
But those buildings aren’t in trendy River North, Highland, Cherry Creek North or South Broadway.
They’re in the Denver Tech Center, on the edge of Denver and the suburbs, where chain stores and eateries, not hip urban concepts, have come to be expected.
At MileHouse and The DEN, two new luxury apartment complexes at Belleview Station, developer Holland Partner Group is creating a community of mostly Denver-born restaurants and retailers collectively making the bet that the south suburbs are hungry for new and local options that don’t involve having to battle traffic to and from downtown.
“Urban concepts are continuing to make their way into the Denver suburbs, and Belleview Station is becoming a hub,” said Scott Menefee, senior development director for Holland Partner Group. “There is an untapped amount of customers who are just not willing to make the drive downtown but are willing to make the short drive here.”
The master plan for development around Belleview Station, which sits between Union and Belleview avenues on the west side of Interstate 25, calls for extensive ground-floor retail in the office and residential buildings along the streets leading to the light-rail platform.
Holland’s two buildings include more than 69,000 square feet of retail space, primarily along South Newport Street and East Belleview Avenue. All but a handful of the 23 storefronts have already been spoken for, according to marketing materials.
Confirmed tenants are Waxing the City, Orangetheory Fitness, Crushed Red, Backcountry Delicatessen, Corvus, Matthew Morris, Los Chingones, Spa 810, Ambli Restaurant & Lounge, Highland Tap & Burger, Little Nest Portraits, Barre 3, Sushi-Rama, Pacific Dental Services, PeakMed and Urban Egg.
Denver-based Urban Legend is handling the retail leasing, and president Kelly Greene said it’s a misconception that suburban dwellers desire only generic chain restaurants and retailers.
“Go to the Landmark tonight and you’ll think it’s New Year’s Eve,” Greene said of Friday nights. “It’s packed.”
The Greenwood Village mixed-use development — a project for which Greene also served on the retail leasing team — is home to a number of local concepts, including Pizza Republica, Jing, Hapa Sushi, Upstairs Circus and A Line Boutique.
“Our trade areas — that’s a retail term — are shrinking because the drive time is growing,” Greene said. “You’re not going to go as far.”
Getting business owners to see the value of the Tech Center really comes down to education, Greene said. Within a 3-mile radius of Belleview Station, there was an estimated daytime population of 91,435 in 2015, according to the project’s marketing materials. The overall population was 96,772 — with an average household income of $110,904.
“As more of these are open and successful and there’s a story to tell that is quantifiable, then I hate to use the word ‘sheep mentality,’ but others will follow,” he said. “They’re going to see that there are plenty of customers out here with disposable income and the cost of doing business is less and it’s proven.”
Holland was committed from the get-go to attracting tenants that represented some of Denver’s coolest and best-in-class concepts, Menefee said.
“You don’t need to drive by three of the locations to get to ours,” he said. “We wanted to make this unique and special and give you a reason to come here, rather than ‘Oh, I did that already on the way.’ ”
At full buildout, Belleview Station’s master plan contemplates 300,000 square feet of retail space, along with 2.2 million square feet of office space, 1,800 residential units and one or two hotels, according to the project website. One Belleview Station, a new, 318,000-square-footoffice building, is now leasing at the corner of East Belleview and South Quebec Street.
Holland’s two apartment buildings, which opened in the fall of 2014 and August, target millennial tenants who are looking for a walkable lifestyle near transit but still want a car for weekend trips to the mountains.
Leasing activity so far has been strong, Menefee said. MileHouse’s 353 units are 97 percent leased, and more than half of the 325 apartments at The DEN, still in its initial leasing stage, are spoken for. Rents start at $1,270 for a studio at MileHouse and $1,209 at The DEN.
“What people are telling us why they live here is the retail amenities outside their doorstep and the proximity to light rail,” Menefee said. “There’s a lot of great new apartment complexes that have been built — what sets us apart are the retail amenities.”
Demographics outweigh uncertainty of trading urban core for suburbs
Many of those retailers will tell you a similar story: Any initial trepidation in trading Denver’s urban core for the Tech Center was outweighed by the area’s demographics, the project’s proximity to a light-rail station and the fact that many of their current customers already call the southern suburbs home.
“To say something like they don’t want independent restaurants is sort of a real simple way of looking at it,” said Juan Padro, managing partner of the group behind Highland Tap & Burger, which is planning an early 2018 opening at Belleview Station. “There are different needs in every community.”
Denver chef/restaurateur Troy Guard was looking to fill what he saw as a lack of modern Mexican options when he opened his second outpost of Los Chingones in MileHouse in November 2015. The original location is on Larimer Street in Denver’s River North Art District.
“A lot of our guests live in that area. They come downtown and they know our brands and our restaurants,” Guard said. “I thought that was a good fit.”
Just about everyone considering Belleview Station has reached out to Guard — the first restaurateur in — to get his thoughts on the area, he said.
“We’re a pretty tight-knit restaurant community. When someone does well or someone does poorly, we like to share that. When they saw me go in there, they were saying, ‘Oh, Troy must be crazy.’ ” Guard said. “I’ve liked the location. I’ve liked the landlord. Those are always two big things. Nothing’s worse than not having a good landlord. We’ve done well. We’re happy with the clientele.”
Corvus Coffee Roasters owner Phil Goodlaxson said Belleview Station checked off a lot of boxes for him, too, including his desire to stay on the south side of Denver. The flagship coffee shop is on South Broadway, south of Interstate 25.
“Initially, I wanted to have a more urban brand, but thinking critically about it, our target demographic is absolutely surrounding us in that spot,” Goodlaxson said. “It’s a demographic of people who ask, ‘What can I get if I really look for and pay for really good quality?’ For coffee, that exists as much in the suburbs as it does downtown.”
The careful consideration Holland and Urban Legend undertook in creating a community of tenants was another major selling point for the project, he said.
For its DTC shop, Corvus focused on creating something that would challenge its team more than just “opening another shop to serve Corvus coffee,” he said. They chose a Kyoto cold-brew program that allows them to produce and bottle cold-brew coffee using each of their single-origin varieties. They also created a menu of alcohol-free coffee cocktails that play off the unique flavor profile of each single-origin brew.
“Having good neighbors is almost as important as the spot itself. You don’t want to be next to McDonald’s,” Goodlaxson said. “They’re actively trying to look for brands they were excited about — not just who could pay the most rent.”
Now open near Belleview Station
- Los Chingones
- Orangetheory Fitness
- Backcountry Delicatessen
- Barre 3
- Corvus Coffee Roasters
- Crushed Red
- Waxing the City
Coming soon
- Urban Egg — spring
- Matthew Morris Salon — spring
- Little Nest Portraits — spring
- AMBLI — mid-2017
- Sushi-Rama – summer
- Spa 810 — summer
- Highland Tap & Burger — early 2018