Speaker 1: This is Masters in Business with Barry Ridholts on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: This week on the podcast, I have a special guest.
Speaker 1: His name is Eldon Scott, and he is president of
Speaker 1: Urban Space, which is the New York branch of a
Speaker 1: fascinating company that began life in London, England. If you
Speaker 1: have gone to any of the new and very hip
Speaker 1: food courts around New York City, I'm partial to the
Speaker 1: one on Vanderbilt and but they're all over Manhattan, you
Speaker 1: will have experienced some of Urban Spaces work. They are
Speaker 1: just really really good at totally recreating the concept of
Speaker 1: a food court. You know, when I think of food courts,
Speaker 1: I think of the terrible mall based um, really awful
Speaker 1: chain foods. What they do is they go out and
Speaker 1: find the most interesting chefs, entrepreneurs hip places in Brooklyn
Speaker 1: and they bring them to Manhattan as food stalls, and
Speaker 1: and some of them are just The food is fantastic.
Speaker 1: The vibe and the energy in these places are just amazing.
Speaker 1: I strongly suggest that if you're anywhere near New York
Speaker 1: City and have an opportunity to try one of these places,
Speaker 1: you really like it. They also do all of the
Speaker 1: holiday uh sales um temporary spaces that pop up in
Speaker 1: places like Brian Park and Grand Central Station. Uh. Again,
Speaker 1: no chains, just unique one off merchants and entrepreneurs and designers.
Speaker 1: Really really interesting thing. If you are at all interested
Speaker 1: in food and how various chefs become popular, uh, and
Speaker 1: about the future of how food is going to be
Speaker 1: served in places like conference facilities, malls, etcetera, then this
Speaker 1: is something you actually absolutely have to listen to. With
Speaker 1: no further ado. My conversation with Eldon Scott. My special
Speaker 1: guest this week is Elden Scott. He is the president
Speaker 1: and CEO of urban Space, a unique real estate, dining
Speaker 1: and retail establishment that given how difficult retail has been
Speaker 1: these days, I thought it would be nice to bring
Speaker 1: someone in who has achieved a high degree of success
Speaker 1: in retailing and restaurateuring. Uh. Eldon went to undergraduate at
Speaker 1: Yale University. He then moved on to the London School
Speaker 1: of Economics before joining Urban Space in London. The London
Speaker 1: Urban Space was founded in nineteen seventy by Eric Reynolds,
Speaker 1: where it has since developed more than fifty sites, focusing
Speaker 1: on artisanal and casual food and unique holiday fairs in
Speaker 1: Eldon left London for New York City, where he opens
Speaker 1: Urban Space, the first one in America, focusing on the
Speaker 1: holiday fair in Grand Central. Now, Urban Space has a
Speaker 1: number of locations in New York uh the Vanderbilt Market,
Speaker 1: five seventy Les, Times Square, Madison Square, Broadway Bites, the
Speaker 1: Garment District. They also run a number of different holiday
Speaker 1: fairs Grand Central Station, Brian Park, Union Square, Columbus Circle.
Speaker 1: And the company is about to take this unique business
Speaker 1: model national. Eldon Scott, welcome to Bloomberg. Thank you so
Speaker 1: much so so I hope I did that justice in
Speaker 1: explaining sort of what what urban spaces. It's a fairly
Speaker 1: unique model. Before we get into the details of it,
Speaker 1: let's talk a little bit about your background. Um, you
Speaker 1: mentioned you're a boarding school kid. You end up going
Speaker 1: to Yale and then London School of Economics led you
Speaker 1: to Urban Space in London after you got out of
Speaker 1: ls A. You know, I've always lived in residential types
Speaker 1: of communities through boarding school and then at Yale, and
Speaker 1: you know, these these great colleges, we have wonderful dining
Speaker 1: halls and one of the hearts of universities are these
Speaker 1: dining halls. So I've always finished in this idea of
Speaker 1: community and meeting other people around food and in communal
Speaker 1: seating as well. So I think there's a little bit
Speaker 1: of inspiration from those experiences that I took with me
Speaker 1: to London. So did you go straight to urban space
Speaker 1: out of London School of Economics or were there any
Speaker 1: Um My background is urban planning in real estate, so
Speaker 1: I worked in the coch Administration in the Department of
Speaker 1: City Planning for a while. It's my first job new Haven,
Speaker 1: New York City urban Planning. Then Lesse studied urban planning
Speaker 1: and economics, and then I worked for Savills, which is
Speaker 1: a property company in London. So I had some traditional
Speaker 1: real estate and planning background. So then how did you
Speaker 1: still belong to urban space? Well, you know, like a
Speaker 1: lot of other young people on London, I was going
Speaker 1: up to Camden Locke on the weekends, which was a
Speaker 1: great place if you haven't been there, it's it's north
Speaker 1: side of London and it's a fantastic, very busy spot.
Speaker 1: And I was talking to my professor from LC one
Speaker 1: day and I was like, I love this place, Camden
Speaker 1: lock I gotta meet Eric Reynolds. He's a friend of mine,
Speaker 1: so I met Eric and shortly thereafter I left Savage
Speaker 1: and started working with him at Urban Space. So he
Speaker 1: set up Urban Space in the UK in nine seventy.
Speaker 1: When when this was first brought to the four there,
Speaker 1: did they have to raise capital or did it just
Speaker 1: sort of start small and and go from there. It
Speaker 1: started the small and went from there. Having said that,
Speaker 1: there were a couple of investors that Eric brought in
Speaker 1: early on with Camden Locke. I mean Camden grew to
Speaker 1: become the third or fourth biggest visitor destination in London
Speaker 1: and was a real phenomenon at the time because you
Speaker 1: have to remember in the seventies there were trading laws.
Speaker 1: You couldn't open on Sundays UM, but you could open
Speaker 1: markets on Sundays. So it was one of the first,
Speaker 1: if not the first large private market to open in
Speaker 1: London UM at that time. And it just really drew
Speaker 1: and it got a lot of the youth culture coming down.
Speaker 1: So that was a regulatory loophole. You couldn't have regular
Speaker 1: retail open, but open air marketplace was allowed to run exactly.
Speaker 1: And the same question in the United States. You come
Speaker 1: here with the intention of setting up urban Space, new York.
Speaker 1: Did you have to raise capital or by that time
Speaker 1: was there enough capital from London. It was already had
Speaker 1: enough capital by that time to to get going, So
Speaker 1: we just applied the knowledge experience we had. I was
Speaker 1: wanting to bring it to New York for a long
Speaker 1: time because I was, you know, living in London, traveling
Speaker 1: to a lot of European capitals, and it was such
Speaker 1: a great market culture in Europe that I knew there
Speaker 1: was something would be great in the United States. So
Speaker 1: I wanted to bring it back. So I have been
Speaker 1: writing about and talking about the death of retail for
Speaker 1: it seems like a decade, if not longer. And part
Speaker 1: of retail has to do with the the dining experience,
Speaker 1: the traditional mall in America, it's a handful of chains.
Speaker 1: It's a handful of well known, nothing unique, nothing special.
Speaker 1: Are we at the edge of the death of the
Speaker 1: food court? Is that going the way of the Dodo Bird?
Speaker 1: I don't think we're the it's the death of the
Speaker 1: food court. I think that the food hall is a
Speaker 1: variation on an old theme and it's it's a new segment,
Speaker 1: if you will. But I think there's still a lot
Speaker 1: of other concepts which are gonna, you know, continue to
Speaker 1: thrive as well. There's gonna be more food options, not less,
Speaker 1: so the food court might be replaced with a food
Speaker 1: hall or something a little more hip or a little
Speaker 1: more innovative. Is that a fair assessment. The main difference
Speaker 1: really is that the food hall has generally speaking, more
Speaker 1: local and chef driven concepts. So let's talk about that
Speaker 1: a little bit. I go to the one on Vanderbilt
Speaker 1: all the time. I'm a huge fan of Delaney Chicken.
Speaker 1: It's the greatest chicken sandwich I've ever had. Uh. Mr
Speaker 1: Byng is just absolutely unique and um just a favorite.
Speaker 1: And then there's a shop called Dough which does the
Speaker 1: biggest donuts I've ever seen in my life, and they're
Speaker 1: crazy delicious. Um, as are everything I've tasted. This is
Speaker 1: a completely different approach to feeding people. It's not like
Speaker 1: in New York you walk into a Delhi and there's
Speaker 1: ninety seven different serving stations and you can get anything
Speaker 1: from Medio, compizza or whatever. This is the opposite of that.
Speaker 1: This is very specific artisanal foods. It's it's a bottom
Speaker 1: up um business model versus a top down business model.
Speaker 1: So instead of a large restaurant company that's got a
Speaker 1: you know, senior management, and they're planning out what the
Speaker 1: menus are going to be. We're really, we're truly market operators.
Speaker 1: So we go to the market and we try to
Speaker 1: find out what the coolest concepts are and we bring
Speaker 1: them into one facility. You know, markets are two thousand
Speaker 1: years old and people have had that kind of experience
Speaker 1: where you can match consumers and vendors in the central
Speaker 1: place and the central places the market operator and that's
Speaker 1: what we are. So one analogy we give is it's
Speaker 1: a little bit like an artificial reef. So if you
Speaker 1: ever been snorkeling, you go out, you find a good area,
Speaker 1: you drop down a bunch of old tires and old
Speaker 1: cinder blocks, but the real color or the fish that
Speaker 1: are coming. So it's not the architecture, it's not it's
Speaker 1: not all the planning per se. It's just bringing together
Speaker 1: market forces. Is bringing together the best of other businesses
Speaker 1: and putting them together. I read an interesting report recently
Speaker 1: from Kushman and Wakefield. They pointed out New York City
Speaker 1: has twenty five or so active permanent food halls with
Speaker 1: another dozen or so planned, but nationwide they think the
Speaker 1: number of these food holes will hit three hundred is that?
Speaker 1: Is that a real number? Three hundred foot holes around
Speaker 1: the country rate. It's funny. I was talking to the
Speaker 1: guys that Kushman a couple of weeks ago, and we
Speaker 1: actually think it's probably much higher than that, really because
Speaker 1: not all the things that are in the pipeline or
Speaker 1: even being discussed. Um, I think there's gonna be too
Speaker 1: much of it. It's gonna probably be some overbuilding and well,
Speaker 1: but that happens in every every hot new trends eventually
Speaker 1: reaches saturation and then it's too much for and that
Speaker 1: that's true whether we're talking about fried chicken sandwiches or
Speaker 1: man buns. At a certain point, it just it just
Speaker 1: goes too far. So we mentioned Delaney Chicken and some
Speaker 1: of some of my other favorites. I have to ask you,
Speaker 1: how do you source vendors every You just opened up
Speaker 1: one on Lexington Avenue five seventy where Mr Kay's used
Speaker 1: to be. You know that restaurant for a million years,
Speaker 1: and it's just a completely different set of hip, funky restaurants.
Speaker 1: How do you guys consistently find such interesting vendors to
Speaker 1: sell such unique food. We have a we have a
Speaker 1: little bit of an advantage because we have our own
Speaker 1: farm League set up, so we have these pop up
Speaker 1: markets that we've been doing for years all around the city.
Speaker 1: So we're in Madison Square, We're in we're in Bryant
Speaker 1: Park in Square, and this is around the holidays. Usually
Speaker 1: last couple of months is too open. Right now, Um
Speaker 1: Square and Herald Square their food only markets. So what
Speaker 1: we do is we bring people in and we try
Speaker 1: them out. Because you know, you can have a great food,
Speaker 1: you can be a great operator. You can be a
Speaker 1: super highly followed chef. But we're looking for people that
Speaker 1: are not just don't just have a great following, they're
Speaker 1: also really good operators. You can also be a great
Speaker 1: chef and not how to know how to cook in volume.
Speaker 1: There's a big leap it takes to go from having
Speaker 1: a tasty item to be able to serve a thousand
Speaker 1: of those items pretty quickly. And I will tell listeners,
Speaker 1: if you walk over to the Vanderbilt one, it's on
Speaker 1: forty Street in Vanderbilt. At five to twelve, you can
Speaker 1: walk in and walk into any vendor and get whatever
Speaker 1: you want. At five after twelve, there's it's just flooded
Speaker 1: with people, especially millennials and young people, and then after
Speaker 1: two thirty again it empties out. That's got to be
Speaker 1: a challenge to manage that sort of crush for any
Speaker 1: chef or restaurant um operator. Yeah, and we're kind of
Speaker 1: partner with the chefs in the space to help give
Speaker 1: them the infrastructure that they need. Sometimes they like more infrastructure,
Speaker 1: more storage, etcetera, etcetera. UM. But the ones that figure
Speaker 1: it out do really well, and luckily not too many don't.
Speaker 1: But I think that they kind of learned from each other,
Speaker 1: so they'll look down the I almost say, hey, why
Speaker 1: is that guy cranking it? Why is this line moving?
Speaker 1: And they'll start to learn. But having said that, it's
Speaker 1: there's a big skilled jump from being a good chef
Speaker 1: to really producing quality and volume. So you you talked about, um,
Speaker 1: how trendy. A lot of this is I think your
Speaker 1: vendors are the most on trend foods in town. Not
Speaker 1: surprised that you. The new place has a Raman specialists.
Speaker 1: There's a ton of niche sort of foods. It's not
Speaker 1: just oh I'm going to open a Chinese food. Mr.
Speaker 1: Byng is a perfect example. It's a very specific niche.
Speaker 1: So my question is how intense is the competition for people, um,
Speaker 1: for chefs and others who want into the next urban
Speaker 1: space market, and how do you make that that decision
Speaker 1: This person is good, this person um may not be
Speaker 1: an excellent fit. It's competitive because they're great locations and
Speaker 1: the chefs want to be in those locations. So what
Speaker 1: we do is we have a separate department that does leasing,
Speaker 1: and we're looking at sales data from our other markets
Speaker 1: are pop up markets, and if we see something that
Speaker 1: looks like it's doing really well, we let the public decide.
Speaker 1: We don't tell us. We all should read social media
Speaker 1: and all that kind of stuff, and then all the
Speaker 1: senior people will go to that restaurant and we'll see
Speaker 1: what we like about the food, about the menu, about
Speaker 1: the environment, about the service, and will make sure that
Speaker 1: there's a whole list of things will look at to
Speaker 1: make sure it's the best vendor in that sector. So
Speaker 1: you mentioned you track sales and stuff. What metrics do
Speaker 1: you look at to determine if a given space is
Speaker 1: meeting your expectations or if a given vendor is being successful.
Speaker 1: You know, there's a lot of different metrics you can
Speaker 1: look at at the end of the day, it's sales
Speaker 1: sales volume. Well, what other metrics would you even consider?
Speaker 1: Obviously volume is um important, but is it consistent volume?
Speaker 1: You could I've seen some days. Well, it's different day parts,
Speaker 1: you know. You know, some vendors are going to be
Speaker 1: better at lunch. I'm gonna do better after work. You know.
Speaker 1: If we want to have a few things that will
Speaker 1: work for for breakfast, so we will put someone in
Speaker 1: with the lower sales volume, just because it's filling a
Speaker 1: niche that we need. So there's it's it's science and art.
Speaker 1: It's it's all mixed again to the mix. And I
Speaker 1: first became familiar with the concept of a food haul
Speaker 1: years ago when Italy opens up UM, and I have
Speaker 1: my favorite Italian places. So I'm probably not the ideal
Speaker 1: person to talk to about Italy because I have my
Speaker 1: other favorite pasta places and favorite um pizza places. But
Speaker 1: what did you think of when you saw a concept
Speaker 1: like Italy, uh come into play. It's a great model.
Speaker 1: It's essentially a more top down model. I mean, there
Speaker 1: are some sub tenants in there, but it's primarily more
Speaker 1: of a planned uh you know, food concept with stations. Um,
Speaker 1: it's interesting because we had our first all food pop
Speaker 1: up market at Madison Square outside of the first Italy,
Speaker 1: and I remember at that time people saying, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: really great, but you know, outside as an actual market.
Speaker 1: From the perspective of individual vendors and entrepreneurs, you know,
Speaker 1: you're not necessarily going to meet the entrepreneur at in Italy,
Speaker 1: but you're very well going to meet the entrepreneur or
Speaker 1: the chef at one of the food halls of one
Speaker 1: of the food markets. I one one day my wife
Speaker 1: had heard me talk about Mr Bing for forever, and
Speaker 1: she was here for a show and it was four
Speaker 1: in the afternoon, so I said, hey, it's not crowded,
Speaker 1: let's walk over there and grab a Mr Bing and
Speaker 1: person who built it was there. We had a whole conversation. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I went to school in China and I studied and
Speaker 1: we always love this street vendor and there was nothing
Speaker 1: like it here in the States. And this worked out perfectly,
Speaker 1: which which leads to a question, given that there are
Speaker 1: so many different restaurants in New York, Um, can these
Speaker 1: little pop ups compete with the restaurant? Do they have
Speaker 1: the ability to go toe tootell with someone who's there,
Speaker 1: who's going to see people or is this a totally
Speaker 1: different market. I mean, obviously there's some crossover, but it's
Speaker 1: a different market. We're not doing full service. If you
Speaker 1: want to have a great business lunch with five people
Speaker 1: and you want to have a reservation and waiter service,
Speaker 1: you're probably not gonna go to a food hall. But
Speaker 1: if you're okay with a little more bustling environment for
Speaker 1: a business lunert sometimes people are, then you know that's
Speaker 1: where you might want to go. And do you think
Speaker 1: of urban Space as a real estate play or is
Speaker 1: it a restaurant play? Everyone asked it set it's a
Speaker 1: little bit both. Were really a real estate company from
Speaker 1: the perspective that we acquire property and we sub lease property,
Speaker 1: but we also act like an FMP brand, and we
Speaker 1: also see ourselves as more of a brand than most
Speaker 1: real estate companies would. I was trying to explain urban
Speaker 1: Space to a friend who's not from New York but
Speaker 1: understands we work, and I said, it's we work for
Speaker 1: food and they kind of got that. Let's talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about the holiday fairs, because that's how I
Speaker 1: first discovered UM who you folks were who Urban space was? Um?
Speaker 1: Grand Central Station has a giant holiday fair every holiday season,
Speaker 1: Brian Park, you guys take over the park, Union Square
Speaker 1: Holiday Market Columbus Square Holiday Market for many years every
Speaker 1: holiday I got my wife a gift from Deborah Armstrong,
Speaker 1: who was an artisan and jewelry designer. How did the
Speaker 1: concept of these pop up temporary holiday fairs come about? Well,
Speaker 1: I mean I came back from London and I was
Speaker 1: I was used to go into these Chris Kindall's markets
Speaker 1: in which are throughout Europe, and we didn't really have
Speaker 1: a strong tradition of those in the States. Uh, this
Speaker 1: was gosh, I don't know. In nineties, late nineties. Um,
Speaker 1: so I first approached Grand Central Terminal and they just
Speaker 1: renovated the main waiting room. This is going back a
Speaker 1: lot of years. And they said, well, may it may
Speaker 1: not work, but give it a shot. So we did.
Speaker 1: You wasn't like years of haggling and negotiating. It was
Speaker 1: just you have this empty space, I'd like to use
Speaker 1: it for a holiday fair. It will generate revenue for
Speaker 1: the for the station. How does that sound? And that? Okay?
Speaker 1: Sure it was a test at first, you know, later on,
Speaker 1: there was a lot more negotiating, haggling. You're aware that
Speaker 1: that is not the usual way stuff gets done in
Speaker 1: in New York City. Well, you know, there weren't a
Speaker 1: lot of great users of public spaces back in the nineties.
Speaker 1: You know, there were a lot of as many concepts.
Speaker 1: There's a lot more great concept there's a lot more
Speaker 1: great street food today there wasn't back then. So people
Speaker 1: were looking for things like this, and Grand Central Station
Speaker 1: was was at full The renovation finished not that long ago,
Speaker 1: less than a ten years ago, the full full renovation.
Speaker 1: The main the main part of that. This was just
Speaker 1: the south waiting room. Is that the waiting room, and
Speaker 1: then we moved it shortly thereafter to an outdoor uh
Speaker 1: situation at Union Square, so that was a little bit larger.
Speaker 1: And so when I lived on Lexington Avenue, we would
Speaker 1: have a street fair every year, and it was very
Speaker 1: quickly became boring and repetitive. It was the same junk
Speaker 1: tube socks and just regular commercial stuff. Why have the
Speaker 1: street fairs failed where your holiday fairs seemed to be
Speaker 1: very successful and thrive every year. It's about the quality
Speaker 1: of the product and the curation of the product. So
Speaker 1: a lot of what we do as the operator is
Speaker 1: curation and storytelling because we're trying to find vendors that
Speaker 1: our entrepreneurs from New Yorker sometimes beyond you or and
Speaker 1: have a real story and a real craft or something
Speaker 1: to bring to the consumer. So let's talk about the
Speaker 1: numbers behind that. I read somewhere about the vendors are
Speaker 1: local for meither New York or the surrounding areas, and
Speaker 1: are international. Is that more or less accurate something like that?
Speaker 1: I mean, we we've had a guy forever who came
Speaker 1: from comes from Colorado. Once a year he makes candles,
Speaker 1: loads up his van, comes to New York. So New
Speaker 1: York is known as a place that the hallidays, where
Speaker 1: you can sell products, and then you will. I also
Speaker 1: read that you have an unusually high percentage of women
Speaker 1: and minority vendors. Is that right, that's a huge number. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think that's this reflective of the entrepreneurial community and
Speaker 1: getting access to, you know, great real estate so they
Speaker 1: can sell. So that's it's an outcome of what's out
Speaker 1: there in the marketplace. And let me give you a
Speaker 1: quote of yours and get a comment, because I love
Speaker 1: this perspective. Most retail in America is top down, where
Speaker 1: you have national chains that have bios who decide what
Speaker 1: fashions are and distribute down to stores our models. The opposite,
Speaker 1: we're dealing almost exclusively with small independent businesses, not national chains.
Speaker 1: Is that the difference between a marketplace and a regular
Speaker 1: sort of retailer. Yeah, I mean that's what we offer
Speaker 1: over going to a national store. UH and the way
Speaker 1: our buying gets done. Obviously we're curating, we're meeting, we're
Speaker 1: looking at product, but at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: we're looking at their UH, their sales and their behavior
Speaker 1: and how the consumer likes their product, and that's how
Speaker 1: we release our change for the next year. So we're
Speaker 1: really listening to the marketplace. It's a market what's what's
Speaker 1: the turnover, like how many people are repeat vendors and
Speaker 1: how many people are fresh faces. We have turnover every year,
Speaker 1: sometimes not because of the products. Sometimes people move on,
Speaker 1: they get they get larger. UM the Body Shop, which
Speaker 1: became a major international change, UM had a stall a
Speaker 1: canden Lock in London in the nineteen seventies. Um she
Speaker 1: started with a table selling potions. She came from the Midlands,
Speaker 1: but that was their first London outlets. Sou Saban, which
Speaker 1: is a pretty big retailer now started with with with
Speaker 1: stalls and some of the markets, so some of them
Speaker 1: grow out of it. That's amazing. I mentioned, um your
Speaker 1: background having worked with the urban space in London, and
Speaker 1: I read recently that you were looking at Chicago and
Speaker 1: the West coast. How big do you think the concept
Speaker 1: of food halls and gift fares can get nationally? Where
Speaker 1: can this go? Certainly can go further? How much? I
Speaker 1: don't have the answer to. There's gonna be a lot
Speaker 1: of it coming because we're not the only ones going
Speaker 1: into Chicago, going to other cities, so it's gonna be
Speaker 1: interesting to see who are your competitors, Oh, you know,
Speaker 1: anything from other restaurateurs that are doing multiple these concepts,
Speaker 1: or landlords who are putting things in their buildings. So
Speaker 1: it's really coming from multiple directions. So there's a building.
Speaker 1: I want to say it's thirty eighth and Broadway. Since
Speaker 1: you brought this up, and the interesting thing they did
Speaker 1: with the ground floor is every real estate tenant is
Speaker 1: a fairly hip new restaurant. I can't say I've ever
Speaker 1: seen that before. It's a relatively new building. I don't
Speaker 1: know if you're familiar with that that area, Is that
Speaker 1: the sort of concept that that might we might see
Speaker 1: more of. Are those potential competitors out there or there's
Speaker 1: something that you do. Sure, we would not normally just
Speaker 1: put a bunch of retailers on a street like that,
Speaker 1: because we're more interested in the community aspect of what
Speaker 1: a food hall is. And I think that's one of
Speaker 1: the compelling things about food halls, is that the interaction
Speaker 1: between all the various people all in one place at
Speaker 1: one time. You know, they I think since two at
Speaker 1: least people have been talking about locals the new luxury,
Speaker 1: food is the new fashion, and everyone the buzzword is authenticity.
Speaker 1: You know, we've been dealing with authenticity since the seventies.
Speaker 1: And we started this because we were always working with
Speaker 1: local small businesses. UM. For many years we couldn't we
Speaker 1: weren't considered a major tenant by landlords because they were
Speaker 1: looking for national credit. Now everyone's looking for authenticity, So
Speaker 1: you know that the tide has changed. Suddenly, it's inverted,
Speaker 1: it's it's different than it was. So so speaking of
Speaker 1: the beginning of nineteen seventies, UM, the person who founded
Speaker 1: Every Space in London in nineteen seventy was Eric Reynolds,
Speaker 1: who sort of used the catchphrase lighter, quicker, cheaper um.
Speaker 1: Is that still the watchword? And is that how you
Speaker 1: approach setting up a new space? And does the economy
Speaker 1: itself make a difference in how you operate? Is the
Speaker 1: economy only makes a difference if humors are buying our products,
Speaker 1: So we're not as impacted by interest rates or other fluctuations.
Speaker 1: We're just, you know, we're interested in our people buying
Speaker 1: our product. I mean, outside of the Great Recession when
Speaker 1: things were horrific, the economy gets better, it gets what
Speaker 1: a little worse? Are you guys? Fairly recession proof short
Speaker 1: of a near depression in UM in two thousand and
Speaker 1: eight when things were a little rough, I was hiding
Speaker 1: under my desk along with everyone else, and we had
Speaker 1: a holiday market at Union Square to put on, so, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, we came out and it turns out people
Speaker 1: came out of the woodwork. They wanted to be in
Speaker 1: the parks, they wanted to be outside, they wanted to
Speaker 1: be with other people. And that's when we first really
Speaker 1: started to think in that people are looking for human experience,
Speaker 1: like an authentic experience, and our sales were up so
Speaker 1: from your sales were up in two eight. Yes, that's astonishing,
Speaker 1: but we weren't selling items for selling items, so the
Speaker 1: thought processes and they're staying away from expensive stores and
Speaker 1: going to the fairs where they can still find something
Speaker 1: a little unique and interesting but much more reasonably priced,
Speaker 1: and looking for experience and connection. And I think that's
Speaker 1: one of the things that we're able to offer very
Speaker 1: very different than a retail store experiences when you're actually
Speaker 1: interacting with not just a vendor, but the entrepreneur who
Speaker 1: may be the designer or the builder of whatever that
Speaker 1: particular good he is that's being sold. Yeah. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: that's a little bit of where the letter cricker cheaper
Speaker 1: comes from, is that, you know, we're setting up the
Speaker 1: rough space, um, but we're looking to the vendor to
Speaker 1: really brand themselves within the parameters of what we give them.
Speaker 1: So that's you know, people ask us how you can
Speaker 1: do these things in about four or five days as
Speaker 1: long it takes us to put these out, and it's
Speaker 1: because it's you know, many hands to make small work. Right.
Speaker 1: So a previous guest was Dan Biederman. He was the
Speaker 1: person who helped design Brian Square Park in an number
Speaker 1: of other public private projects, and one of the things
Speaker 1: that stood out from that conversation was he else programming
Speaker 1: was the key to making a space successful, that you
Speaker 1: had to bring people in, you had to give them
Speaker 1: something to do. And it reminds me a little bit
Speaker 1: of what you're describing, which is the community space, the interaction,
Speaker 1: the experience, not just buying a sandwich or buying a widget,
Speaker 1: but the whole overall experience. Is that a fair statement? Sure?
Speaker 1: I mean what what Dan did with Brian Park was
Speaker 1: amazing from where that started years ago, right for people
Speaker 1: who may not be familiar, Brian Park was right west
Speaker 1: of the New York Public Library. It was a den
Speaker 1: of iniquity, of drug sales and muggings and just terrible.
Speaker 1: And it's now one of the great jewels of Manhattan.
Speaker 1: It really is, and it's actually become a great food
Speaker 1: area as well. Um. So I think that making public
Speaker 1: spaces better is very clearly adds to value in and
Speaker 1: what's happening around those spaces. So I think programming is
Speaker 1: part of that. So one of the questions I wanted
Speaker 1: to get to before UM had to do with UM
Speaker 1: in Paris and in London. I've seen them the gift
Speaker 1: fares as a permanent not just to pop up UM location,
Speaker 1: and I read also Tokyo they're a permanent holiday fairs,
Speaker 1: not temporary holiday affairs. Is that sort of experiences that?
Speaker 1: Can that work in New York? And can that work
Speaker 1: in the United States? Or is that a little more
Speaker 1: continental than the American palette my we have for example,
Speaker 1: candid Lock, which was an urban space project, is a
Speaker 1: year round marketplace UM. I think it's hard to set
Speaker 1: those things up because to get the density and an
Speaker 1: urban center to do that at a real estate value
Speaker 1: that makes sense. I haven't seen it very often, so
Speaker 1: that's one of the reasons why I've done it. Do
Speaker 1: any plans on trying that in the US? Or is
Speaker 1: that really best left to the Europeans? I think it's
Speaker 1: it's not where the trend is right now? Well, where
Speaker 1: is the trend? What? What do you see as the
Speaker 1: next offshoot? It's all food for us, It's it's food.
Speaker 1: It's primarily food. Why is that is food the new entertainment?
Speaker 1: Is that because it's it's something that people need every
Speaker 1: day and it's a way to bring people together in
Speaker 1: a communal experience, and it's a way to connect really
Speaker 1: creative young businesses UM with consumers in a way that's
Speaker 1: more exciting than things that they've had in the past.
Speaker 1: So I have to ask you about urban space itself. Um,
Speaker 1: when you started in ninety New York, how many people
Speaker 1: were working with you here in in in the United States?
Speaker 1: Over year one was just a couple of people, right,
Speaker 1: And what have you expanded to? How many people are
Speaker 1: in urban Space today? We're probably in the head office
Speaker 1: and and what's the relationship with the original London office
Speaker 1: is that still ongoing? Oh yeah, partners. Eric serves on
Speaker 1: our board and has an interest in our company. So
Speaker 1: we talk a lot about trends that are happening in London,
Speaker 1: trends that are happening in New York and in you know,
Speaker 1: compared notes, so which really you know, I know, how
Speaker 1: fashion trends move Paris, Milan, New York and then eventually
Speaker 1: makes its way west. What direction our food trends going.
Speaker 1: I was just in the West Loop of Chicago and
Speaker 1: I was struck by how much it reminded me of Brooklyn.
Speaker 1: Um not what I expected to see and UM and
Speaker 1: for people who may not be familiar with that part
Speaker 1: of Chicago, this was rail tracks and was to die
Speaker 1: for a long time until I want to say sometime
Speaker 1: in the mid nineties, maybe it was Oprah Winfrey set
Speaker 1: up um Harpo Studios there, which is our production company,
Speaker 1: and that started in renaissance there and now it's just
Speaker 1: full blown. It reminds me of Hudson Jord's UM here
Speaker 1: in New York. It's just not cranes everywhere, lots and
Speaker 1: lots of buildings. Is a big Google office there. What
Speaker 1: direction do food trends move? Are you seeing this go
Speaker 1: from you're all to hear vice versa all directions? It's
Speaker 1: kind of it's kind of crazy. I think that it's
Speaker 1: something that's bubbling up UM globally. You know. I was
Speaker 1: speaking with UM, the head of the World Food Street
Speaker 1: Street Food Congress, just last week, and we think we
Speaker 1: have a lot of food halls going on here, well
Speaker 1: in in in Asia and in Singapore. It's it's much
Speaker 1: beyond what we have here. And this is something that
Speaker 1: that is global and that's really more of a cultural tradition.
Speaker 1: Their food stalls and that sort of public communal eating
Speaker 1: experience seems to be have a much longer history than
Speaker 1: we have in the United States. It does, but you
Speaker 1: you still have, uh i'd say, more chef driven concepts
Speaker 1: even within those contexts, kind of growing up out of
Speaker 1: out of the of those street markets. Really that that
Speaker 1: that's quite fastenathing. We have been speaking with Eldon Scott
Speaker 1: of Urban Space. Be sure and check out my daily column.
Speaker 1: You can find that on Bloomberg View dot com. Follow
Speaker 1: me on Twitter at rid Holts. We love your comments,
Speaker 1: feedback and suggestions right to us at m IB podcast
Speaker 1: at Bloomberg dot net. I'm Barry Ridholts. You're listening to
Speaker 1: Master's in Business on Bloomberg Radio. Welcome to the podcast, Eldon,
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for doing this. I am a
Speaker 1: huge fan of what you guys do. And one day
Speaker 1: I was online at Delaney Chicken and looking around, and
Speaker 1: I said, somebody has to be behind this. This sort
Speaker 1: of thing doesn't just spring up fully developed on its own.
Speaker 1: And I started doing a little bit of research and
Speaker 1: eventually reached out to Urban Space, and and here we are.
Speaker 1: I have to ask you a couple of questions about
Speaker 1: your career because a lot of the folks I speak
Speaker 1: to have followed a very specific career path. They went
Speaker 1: to college, they went for an m b A, they
Speaker 1: got a job at a big firm, and then they
Speaker 1: went to a boutique and then they launched the run shop.
Speaker 1: There's a fairly clear path. I think what you did
Speaker 1: is fairly unique. There aren't all that many holiday fair
Speaker 1: slash food halls around, so there can't be that many
Speaker 1: businesses doing this, and therefore there can't be that many
Speaker 1: people with your career path. When when you first accepted
Speaker 1: the gig, did you realize you were taking such a
Speaker 1: non traditional career path in in real estate and urban planning.
Speaker 1: I was young enough so I didn't realize what career
Speaker 1: I was giving up. I just thought it was exciting.
Speaker 1: I wanted to do it, and my background was really
Speaker 1: more urban planning architecture with some real estate, so to
Speaker 1: me it was a new brainer to get involved with
Speaker 1: Camdon Locke, which was which was a very exciting place
Speaker 1: to be and what was the business like in London?
Speaker 1: Had I know that over the forty so years since
Speaker 1: the launch they've done fifty pretty substantial projects. When you joined,
Speaker 1: were they a thriving successful company? The UK have gone
Speaker 1: through a series of economic expansions and ran into some
Speaker 1: trouble in the seventies. They got a little better in
Speaker 1: the eighties, um, and then the nineties everybody exploded. What
Speaker 1: was it like back then? Was it any bit of
Speaker 1: an issue? You joined them when? Late eighties? Is that right? Uh? No?
Speaker 1: The early nineties, Okay, I guess it was late eighties.
Speaker 1: Trying to remember. Yeah, it was like eighties, eight eighty nine. Um, no,
Speaker 1: it was. It was a thriving business. It was. It
Speaker 1: was you know, if you've ever been to London, you
Speaker 1: went to Canon Candon Locke. Especially back then. It was
Speaker 1: you know, even more energetic back then. So it was
Speaker 1: an exciting place to be. And I really got a
Speaker 1: kind of traditional apprenticeship, uh in a business. So you
Speaker 1: know I was out there collecting twenty pound notes from fenders,
Speaker 1: moving stalls around, you know, doing the business from the
Speaker 1: ground up. So this was really hands on sort of
Speaker 1: career from from from the start. It was hands on
Speaker 1: and you know, what you gain is experience. And I
Speaker 1: think what experiences is seeing patterns, um and what you
Speaker 1: see if you do something over and over again, because
Speaker 1: you see, well, if you line up the stalls this way,
Speaker 1: the sales are gonna be better if you line them
Speaker 1: up that way. So we learned our own little rules
Speaker 1: about retail facing retail. How many stalls can you sustain
Speaker 1: for a market? How much traffic do you need? And
Speaker 1: really it was just a body of experience that I
Speaker 1: gained by doing markets now for thirty five years. So no,
Speaker 1: you're just hit or miss, trying a bunch of things
Speaker 1: and then iterating with each subsequent UM. Fair to say,
Speaker 1: here's what we learned with the last one, and slowly
Speaker 1: but surely it just gets more and more robust. You
Speaker 1: you learned. That's why it was like an apprenticeship. You
Speaker 1: learn almost like a craftsperson learns their trade, and you
Speaker 1: start to understand what the internal rules are of that business.
Speaker 1: And that's what we've learned about. Any really unique UM
Speaker 1: experiences stand out, anything that was well, didn't expect that
Speaker 1: to happen. You can say. One of the interesting things
Speaker 1: is the quality of the vendors, both chefs and and
Speaker 1: craftsman has just skyrocketed. UM. So back when I first
Speaker 1: started doing this in New York in the nineties and
Speaker 1: early two thousand's, UM, look, there were a lot of
Speaker 1: there were a lot of great vendors and people making food.
Speaker 1: But sometime around two eight, when the you know, the
Speaker 1: Internet and social media was really kicking in and other
Speaker 1: potential career paths we're looking a little less successful. Um,
Speaker 1: we suddenly started to see a lot more interesting chefs.
Speaker 1: You know that the food truck thing was was blowing up.
Speaker 1: People were off publishing, they were tweeting where they were
Speaker 1: on a certain corner, and suddenly you had people who
Speaker 1: might otherwise have been, you know, trying to develop software
Speaker 1: or get a job in finance, we're saying, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: I can make a really interesting brand. I can make
Speaker 1: a food business. And that's actually only continued to get
Speaker 1: stronger because as you've seen things like shake shacko Public,
Speaker 1: you've had more private equity firms jump into the space
Speaker 1: and more opportunity for young people to to create a
Speaker 1: brand and and and and roll that out. So you
Speaker 1: alluded to something I have to ask, how significant to
Speaker 1: the food halls are social media Instagram, Twitter? How big
Speaker 1: are various people's followings and do they drive traffic to
Speaker 1: different vendors? Yeah? I think I don't think there's any
Speaker 1: business that's not touched by social media, and I think
Speaker 1: that the food halls certainly grown up, the new new
Speaker 1: version of the food halls grown up with social media.
Speaker 1: So a lot of consumer now are you know, looking online,
Speaker 1: Where's where's our food? All wars there the most interesting
Speaker 1: chicken sandwich and they're finding it online. I read something
Speaker 1: that certain food companies are changing the packaging of their
Speaker 1: boxes so they're more Instagram friendly. It's gone that far.
Speaker 1: Uh do we see vendors making dishes pretty bright, colorful,
Speaker 1: whatever it is, so that they're more susceptible to a
Speaker 1: quick snap and neither a tweet or well, you know,
Speaker 1: fast casual is by nature very instagram morble. So why
Speaker 1: why is that? Because you you get, you get a plate,
Speaker 1: you can take a shot on your table, you've got colors,
Speaker 1: you've got different food and if if there's a story
Speaker 1: behind that, and it's not just a national chain sandwich, Um,
Speaker 1: that's something that can be inherent in that, in that
Speaker 1: Instagram or in that Facebook. So you know, people loved it.
Speaker 1: I think food is one of the most highly instagram items. Yeah,
Speaker 1: no doubt about it. So you mentioned earlier narrative, Um,
Speaker 1: how significant is the narrative process to different food vendors
Speaker 1: and and different holiday fair uh craftsmen as well. We
Speaker 1: think it's it's a huge part of it really. We
Speaker 1: think explained that that that's kind of fascinating. Well, you
Speaker 1: know you're going to a market or a place like
Speaker 1: this too, I feel like you're experiencing something that's part
Speaker 1: of the city or part of that community. So even
Speaker 1: if you don't know all the details of each of
Speaker 1: these stories, you get a sense that there are real
Speaker 1: people here with real life stories that have brought this
Speaker 1: product to it to you. And these aren't just corporate
Speaker 1: drones working flipping burgers. These are real chefs and real craftspeople. Well,
Speaker 1: the control that the main control decisions are very localized.
Speaker 1: So it's that entrepreneur has decided they're going to sell
Speaker 1: you know, green sandals or whatever they decide to sell.
Speaker 1: We're not deciding that. So I think that a consumer
Speaker 1: sense is that they're not being sold something from on high.
Speaker 1: This is the result of many individuals making many decisions.
Speaker 1: Quite interesting. I think that that for us, what we
Speaker 1: really look for is to create a sense of community, um,
Speaker 1: and we do that by bringing uh, real live entrepreneurs
Speaker 1: together and real consumers. And that community and authenticity is
Speaker 1: inherent in bringing those communities together in a great space.
Speaker 1: Makes a lot of sense to make. So let me
Speaker 1: jump to my favorite questions. These are what I ask
Speaker 1: all of our guests, um tell us the most important
Speaker 1: thing people don't know about your background that I'm an
Speaker 1: urban planner? Is that true? Probably? Interesting? Who are some
Speaker 1: of your early mentors, Esoteric Lee Christopher Alexander, who is
Speaker 1: an interesting architect and planner who wrote a book called
Speaker 1: a Pattern Language, and he really thought about urban spaces
Speaker 1: as a series of vignettes or patterns that get put
Speaker 1: together into a language. And what's interesting about it is
Speaker 1: that a lot of his thinking was was picked up
Speaker 1: by software engineers in Silicon Valley in the seventies and eighties.
Speaker 1: So there's an interesting tie in between what's happening with
Speaker 1: our perception of urban spaces and what's happening with the
Speaker 1: idea of frames in Instagram or a Facebook and how
Speaker 1: things are organized. What other architects, urban planners, real estate
Speaker 1: developers influenced your approach to thinking about food hales or
Speaker 1: holiday affairs. The Rouse Company, you know what, the Festival Marketplace,
Speaker 1: which really came around the time at the Boston Tennial.
Speaker 1: I was a kid at the time. I grew up
Speaker 1: in Boston, so I'd take the training and I got
Speaker 1: a I got a Fannial Hall. I'd read the Boston
Speaker 1: Globe Real Estate section, and I got excited about the
Speaker 1: idea of markets in the idea of reusing buildings. Probably
Speaker 1: at that time. I've noticed that whenever there's a form
Speaker 1: of um urban renewal, and probably the broadest version of
Speaker 1: this I've seen recently has been in Portland's These buildings
Speaker 1: that were once used for one specific set of purposes
Speaker 1: have now been There were mills, they were mining, smelters
Speaker 1: and things like that. Suddenly they become these very hip
Speaker 1: retailers and restaurants. Is that what you're referring to when
Speaker 1: you talk about repurposing. I think there was an earlier
Speaker 1: phase of market repurposing that started in the seventies that
Speaker 1: you know, the Rass Company was a leader in that.
Speaker 1: You Camden Locke started at that time. I went to
Speaker 1: a markets conference a couple of years ago at Pike's Place,
Speaker 1: and actually Pike's Place was renovated and repurposed in this
Speaker 1: in the mid seventies. Is that what we're talking about Seattle,
Speaker 1: and we had um Eric from London, the guys from
Speaker 1: Pike's Place, we had other guy from South Africa. And
Speaker 1: it was interesting talking to people who had been involved
Speaker 1: at that time redeveloping things. And it was very real
Speaker 1: estate driven. It was like, we got this great warehouse,
Speaker 1: let's reuse it. Today it's different. I think that what's
Speaker 1: happening today is it's very vender driven. It's about the entrepreneur.
Speaker 1: The space is critical, but it's first and foremost about
Speaker 1: the creativity and the idea of who the vendor is.
Speaker 1: And we have many more great vendors than we did
Speaker 1: back then in the seventies. So everybody's favorite question. Tell
Speaker 1: us about some of your favorite books, be they real estate, food,
Speaker 1: architecture related or not. What what are you reading? What
Speaker 1: do you like? Um? I read. I read a lot
Speaker 1: of history, you know, I'm fascinated with the history of cities.
Speaker 1: I read a lot about about London, about New York,
Speaker 1: about other about other great cities and how they developed,
Speaker 1: and the economies of these cities and how the economy
Speaker 1: is interwoven with um how these places have been set up.
Speaker 1: Give us a few book titles. Oh, I love the
Speaker 1: you know the biography of the Wright brothers, and you know,
Speaker 1: if you read the first chapter of that, you know
Speaker 1: the Right brothers were bicycle repair people, but they were
Speaker 1: working in a vibrant city in the nineteenth century where
Speaker 1: you had, you know, a lot of entrepreneurs and a
Speaker 1: lot of access to parts and pieces and ideas and
Speaker 1: a lot of idea of there's no limitation to what
Speaker 1: they could do, and the individual entrepreneur or inventor could
Speaker 1: really put things together and make something new happen. And
Speaker 1: I think what's really exciting to me working in the
Speaker 1: sectors that I see that energy. I see it in Brooklyn,
Speaker 1: now I see it in Boston and Chicago. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of young entrepreneurs who feel empowered by the Internet
Speaker 1: and by the technology to go out and create something
Speaker 1: quite quite interesting. So, so since you started working in
Speaker 1: this space, what has changed? How is it different today
Speaker 1: than it was in the early nineties. What's different today
Speaker 1: is technology has changed everything. Therefore, the consumer preference or
Speaker 1: what consumers are looking for has shifted quite a bit.
Speaker 1: So there's much more interest, which I didn't anticipate what
Speaker 1: happened in markets and in entrepreneurs. So that's exciting. I
Speaker 1: would Well, that leads me to my next question, Um,
Speaker 1: what is it that you're most excited about right now?
Speaker 1: Beyond technology which is changing everything, what really drives me
Speaker 1: and I in a lot of our company is creating
Speaker 1: great places that are social places. So we're not hopefully
Speaker 1: always going to be stuck in our car or home
Speaker 1: looking at our computers. That we can create great places
Speaker 1: where you can be out and leading a civic life,
Speaker 1: if you will, meeting other people, brushing shoulders, meeting entrepreneurs.
Speaker 1: And I think that's a big part of our mission.
Speaker 1: Tell us about a time you failed and what you
Speaker 1: learned from the experience. Oh, I've had plenty of bad markets,
Speaker 1: and I think markets that have filled and I think
Speaker 1: that that's something that currently a lot of our is
Speaker 1: jumping in don't have the experience of knowing that these
Speaker 1: markets just don't work everywhere, and you know they go bad,
Speaker 1: they go bad fast because you don't have a national
Speaker 1: tenant who's signed a tenure. Least, you've got a local guy,
Speaker 1: and that they're leaving the second they're not making money,
Speaker 1: they're walking out the door. So this does not work everywhere.
Speaker 1: And I think a good fifty percent of what's being
Speaker 1: planned right now won't last in the long run really,
Speaker 1: so so there is no long ramp up if this
Speaker 1: these don't come out of the gate working, they have
Speaker 1: a what is it a ninety day window before people say,
Speaker 1: you know, it takes it takes a good year because
Speaker 1: everyone's got great intentions and they're working hard. But you
Speaker 1: know a lot of we we've worked with um a
Speaker 1: group that that that works with small businesses, and they've
Speaker 1: done surveys. A lot of these small businesses don't even
Speaker 1: know if they're profitable. They don't have the books, the bookkeeping,
Speaker 1: or they're not on top enough of what's going on.
Speaker 1: So it may take them a year to realize that
Speaker 1: this isn't working for them. Really, that's amazing. I would
Speaker 1: think if they're not profitable, they're writing a check to
Speaker 1: cover it, you would think they would be aware where
Speaker 1: unless they have capital with another they're living day to
Speaker 1: day and they're as long as they're able to pay
Speaker 1: a bill they're hoping for the sales went increase, So
Speaker 1: so a new market opens up and it's more or
Speaker 1: less got a year to catch on or else. So
Speaker 1: what happens vendors start to leave. When do you make
Speaker 1: the decision, Hey, this isn't working, We're gonna pull the
Speaker 1: plug when the vendors leave. So it becomes an easy
Speaker 1: at the point, Right, how often does that happen? What?
Speaker 1: What's your success rate? Like, you know, early on, I'd
Speaker 1: say two thirds okay, but even still a third failing
Speaker 1: is a pretty Uh that's a pretty big number. And
Speaker 1: now much less because now we're much more cautious. You're
Speaker 1: more cautious, or you just more experienced than knowing what
Speaker 1: works and what does in or some combination experienced and cautious.
Speaker 1: We you know, we get inquiries almost daily and we
Speaker 1: say no, no percent of the time from the space
Speaker 1: or from the vendors or who's who's making the inquiries. Um, landlords, Hey,
Speaker 1: we'd love to set up an urban space here. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and so I look at a place like Vanderbilt. That's
Speaker 1: got to be a fairly long term lease. I assume, right,
Speaker 1: this isn't a pop up. This is there for a while. Um,
Speaker 1: you have lots of other spaces that people approach you
Speaker 1: about like that. Yeah, I mean, look, there's a retail
Speaker 1: is soft. There's a lot of people looking for for tenants.
Speaker 1: Um Ton of empty storefronts, even even Manhattan, which is
Speaker 1: robust and thriving, lots of lots of empty spaces. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and there's gonna be a little bit of price adjustment,
Speaker 1: you know, rents will adjust a little bit. There's other downward,
Speaker 1: you know. I think that I talked to a lot
Speaker 1: of people. I think there'll be other tenants backfilling those spaces.
Speaker 1: But clearly it's a It's a great market to be
Speaker 1: in if you have a a concept that's making money
Speaker 1: right now, right and um so, how many more urban
Speaker 1: space type food halls can Manhattan's support you can open?
Speaker 1: We're opening, definitely opening more in Manhattan. You know, we
Speaker 1: think our trade area is fairly fairly tight. All right,
Speaker 1: So you're a going to guess you're sticking to Midtown
Speaker 1: and downtown by the financial district and maybe Hudson Yards.
Speaker 1: Is that, uh, we're looking at those places, yeah, and others.
Speaker 1: I would assume is it driven more by the office
Speaker 1: worker or is it driven by I look at the
Speaker 1: Upper east Side or the Upper west Side. You have
Speaker 1: a lot of residences and not as many offices. Can
Speaker 1: can an urban space work in an area like that?
Speaker 1: Or do you need the crush of that lunchtime rush.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of different customer bases, so it could.
Speaker 1: It can be residential, it can be tourism, it can
Speaker 1: be office. Obviously there's different patterns to each one of those. Sure,
Speaker 1: so tell us what you do outside of the office
Speaker 1: for fun when you're not thinking about architecture and urban planning.
Speaker 1: What do you do to relax or kickback. I do
Speaker 1: a lot of ski trips with my kids, and we
Speaker 1: do a lot of stuff together as a family. So
Speaker 1: we're skiing, we're playing tennis, were hiking and doing Tuckerman's
Speaker 1: Ravine next month. Where is tucking about Washington? Oh, so
Speaker 1: that's a that's a serious well for the East Coast.
Speaker 1: What advice would you give to a recent college graduate
Speaker 1: or a millennial who was considering working in retail architecture
Speaker 1: or urban planning or any of those sort of work
Speaker 1: that you do, and they were looking for a little
Speaker 1: guns what would you tell them? Definitely, just jump in,
Speaker 1: you get a job, get some experience, um, and start
Speaker 1: start doing it. I think that you need the experience.
Speaker 1: I think if you tried to start, for example, a
Speaker 1: food brand too early without knowing all the ins and outs,
Speaker 1: it could be difficult. On the other hand, if your
Speaker 1: capital etta isn't that high, you'll gain exp is by
Speaker 1: doing it, even if the first one doesn't work. And
Speaker 1: our final question, what do you know about urban planning?
Speaker 1: Rest you touring holiday fairs food halls today that you
Speaker 1: wish you knew twenty plus years ago when you were
Speaker 1: first getting started. What would have been helpful twenty years
Speaker 1: ago to know that today you just take for granted.
Speaker 1: I think what is easier today probably didn't exist twenty
Speaker 1: years ago, which is, you know, access to landlords in
Speaker 1: capital But that's that's just shifted m so to one
Speaker 1: more about capital markets in real estate than than I
Speaker 1: did when I started. But it was it was it
Speaker 1: was tougher to find spaces years ago. That's that's that's
Speaker 1: quite interesting. We have been speaking with Eldin Scott of
Speaker 1: Urban Space. If you enjoy this conversation, be sure and
Speaker 1: look up and enter down an Inch on Apple iTunes
Speaker 1: or overcast wherever your final podcasts are sold, and you
Speaker 1: could see any of our other two hundred plus such conversations.
Speaker 1: We love your comments, feedback and suggestions right to us
Speaker 1: at m IB podcast at Bloomberg dot net. I would
Speaker 1: be remiss if I did not thank our crack staff
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Speaker 1: I'm Barry Ritults. You've been listening to Masters in Business
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