Is Smaller Big-Box Space Working?

SAN DIEGO—Compact-sized stores that are typically known for their big-box footprints “will have broad-reaching effects for urban consumers, local governments and CRE companies alike, providing consumers with more-diverse shopping options closer to home,” Crosbie Gliner Schiffman Southard & Swanson LLP partner Craig Swanson tells GlobeSt.com. As prices per square foot surge, retailers are searching for more compact space in urban areas. Swanson recently helped negotiate the lease of the smaller format Target Express project in San Diego’s burgeoning South Park neighborhood and says this smaller big-box format is an emerging trend in the retail arena, along with high-impact adaptive re-use of regional malls and increase in urban-infill projects with Targets and Costcos. Here, he discusses these and other key retail trends in an exclusive interview with GlobeSt.com. 

GlobeSt.com: How is the emerging smaller big-box format progressing in CRE?