CASTRO VALLEY NEWS YEAR 2 NUMBER 6
WWW.CASTROVALLEYTV.COM
APRIL 2015
Merchants Question Lease Policy at Shopping Center ing in order to open a Vitality Bowl restaurant. Another longtime merchant may potentially leaving the center because someone else looking to move in may foot the bill for thousands of dollars in structural improvements.
T
alk among merchants lage Shopping Center is ness owners could lose er retailer willing to pay
“It has nothing to do with improvements. It does have to do with performance,” explained Tracy O’Neill of Crosspoint Realty who manage the Village Shopping Center. O’Neill told CVN Blenzers and Vitality Bowl were both willing to bankroll improvements, but at the Castro Vilthe perception busitheir lease to anothfor building upgrades.
“What is happening is just wrong. Management should be concerned with bringing in the right people…not just lease to people who have money,” asserted longtime Village merchant Aran Mimran, whose art studio has been in the center for 14 years. The lease for Blenzers retail space—that was up for renewal—went to a franchisee willing to invest a significant amount to upgrade the build-
in the long run, sales receipts at a Vitality Bowl franchise is many times larger than Blenzers and would attract more “foot traffic” to the center. “We had a tough decision to make, but none of this was done on the low-down. We wanted to do what would be in the best interest of the shopping center,” O’Neill added. O’Neill asserts the recent departures of Yogofina and Big Apple Bagel from the center had nothing do with paying for structural improvments.
-Story & Stills by Robert Souza