Copeland's Cheesecake Bistro Takes 10,000 SF at Atlantic Station

ATLANTA-Developer Jim Jacoby’s $2 billion, 138-acre mixed-use Atlantic Station redevelopment has signed New Orleans-based Copeland’s Cheesecake Bistro and the Improv Comedy Club to a total 18,000 sf, bringing the amount of retail space leased at the project to 405,701 sf among 12 tenants.

Atlantic Station leasing representatives declined to disclose the length of the individual leases or their aggregate value. However, F. Denver McGarey, president of the McGary Group, the exclusive national retail leasing company for Atlantic Station, tells GlobeSt.com, “While retail and restaurant lease rates at Atlantic Station vary, based on location within the development and other standard factors, retail space ranges from $30 to $40 per sf, and restaurant space ranges from $35 to $45 per sf.”

“We have achieved critical mass within all categories of executed retail leases, reinforcing those numbers,” McGarey says. Area retail brokers familiar with the project tell GlobeSt.com the average individual lease length is about five years.

The two-story Copeland’s Cheesecake Bistro will be built on the western edge of the central park in Atlantic Station’s District. The Improv Comedy Club will also be built in the District, next to the Atlantic Theater, home to Regal’s 16-screen cinema.

“With our grand opening a little over a year away, momentum is building on Atlantic Station’s retail front,” Bruce Macleod, managing director of retail at Atlantic Station, says in a prepared statement. “We’re fielding 20 calls a day from potential retailers.”

McGarey and Tracy Lojek of Atlantic Station negotiated the two leases for the development’s owner, Atlantic Station LLC. Penelope Cheroff of The Cheroff Group and Warren Mathews of Mathews Real Estate represented Copeland’s Cheesecake Bistro.

Dillard’s of Little Rock, AR is the largest retail tenant signed to date. The department store chain will occupy 225,000 sf on three levels. The 104,839-sf, two-story Regal/United Artists Theatre is the second largest tenant. Other tenants are Claddagh Irish Pub, 8,115 sf; Moe’s Southwest Grill, 2,489 sf; Mama Fu’s Noodle House, 2,467 sf; California Pizza Kitchen, 5,193 sf; Marble Slab Creamery, 1,350 sf; and Eye Gallery, 2,970 sf.

In office leasing, the locally based Arnall Golden Gregory law firm is taking 135,000 sf for its 130-lawyer staff; SouthTrust Bank is leasing 95,000 sf for its 300 employees.