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Coffee Talk (Sara/Mana)
Developers hope to grow new retail
The Isaac brothers and John Simon sure know how to make news. After months of questions surrounding their property purchases in downtown Sarasota, Isaac Holding Group has announced plans to develop a multi-building retail and residential development running from about four blocks south of Main Street up to First Street.
The focal point of the development, called Pineapple Square, is an 11-story triangular development with a pedestrian breezeway at the northwest corner of Pineapple and Lemon. Three of the buildings, including the triangular one, are designed to hold 210 residential units in a mixture of townhomes, condominiums and lofts.
The preliminary designs for two of the partially residential buildings call for below-grade parking for residential owners. The unit owners in a third partially residential building, located at Main and Lemon, will have designated private parking in one of the other two structures.
Overall, the development calls for creating 130,000 square feet of retail space on the street and second levels. The retail would be made up of about 60% national stores and 40% local or regional merchants. The developer also wants the city to pay to construct 600 public parking spaces in main building at an estimated cost of about $9 million.
The biggest obstacles that the developers face are time and the city's plans.
City officials have already talked about issuing a request-for-proposal to build a garage on the city-owned property at State and Lemon. If that RFP is issued, the Isaac brothers' plan, as proposed, wouldn't qualify because it includes no public parking on the site and would delay any actual construction approvals until about March of 2006. At the same time, the 11-story central building is one-story taller than is allowed under the city's comprehensive plan.
As for the time element, Simon is emphatic that there is a very short window of opportunity for the project to be successful.
This week, all three partners have already left Sarasota to prepare for the International Council of Shopping Centers' spring convention in Las Vegas. From May 22 to May 25, retailers and potential retail landlords will gather in Sin City to talk retail and available locations. Simon and the Isaac brothers plan to pitch retailers on the downtown site with the hope of catching them before they lock in plans to go to either the proposed Benderson Development Co. Inc. lifestyle center south of University Parkway or the Westfield Sarasota mall proposed expansion.
What does this additional retail mean for the existing Main Street retail?
"Initially it would be positive," says Lee DeLieto, an agent with Michael Saunders & Co.'s Commercial Group, who was involved in the Isaacs acquisition. "(But) in my personal opinion ... unless the Main Street owners and merchants begin to upgrade and improve their properties they are going to see an adverse effect over time ... as people head to the newer properties."
Name game
With a wave of new community banks washing ashore in Florida, Kendrick Pierce & Co. Inc. is keeping busy.
The Tampa investment bank has raised capital, advised founders, or both, at de novos that include Freedom Bank in Bradenton and Liberty Bank in Clearwater.
Many investment bankers like to convey a musty aura of Old Money prudence. Doesn't a nice WASPy name like Kendrick Pierce do the trick?
The firm's chairman and chief executive, Richard P. Hunt, thought so. "We've had a lot of fun with it because people will call and ask: 'When did you join that old Wall Street firm?'" says Hunt.
Actually, Kendrick Pierce isn't all that old. Yet it does boast a proud, if strained pedigree.
Hunt has worked with hundreds of financial institutions looking to open, get bought or better capitalized over a career spanning four decades. But Kendrick Pierce only goes back to 1995.
After turning around a Colorado trust company, Hunt and one of his sons, Russell L. Hunt, now Kendrick Pierce's president, were looking for something new to do.
"We decided to crank up an investment banking firm," says Dick Hunt. "Russ came up with the name."
Kendrick was the maiden name of Dick Hunt's mother. So far, so good.
It turns out that her great-uncle was Franklin Pierce, 14th president of the United States. In fact, the mother of the thrifty Yankee from New Hampshire was named Anna Kendrick Pierce.
Bingo!
Dick Hunt jokes that the firm may someday put portraits of his maternal grandfather and President Pierce on promotional brochures.
Positive news, for a change
At last, Florida's largest law firm, Holland & Knight LLP, has some positive news. The firm's communications team in Tampa seemed to withdraw from public sight after the media blitz over Howell Melton's decision to promote Tampa shareholder Doug Wright to national chief operating officer even after he faced accusations of harassing young female associates.
In fact, the communications team appears so disorganized it didn't even notify Coffee Talk about this piece of goods news.
BTI Consulting Group has ranked the firm for the third consecutive year on its Client Service A-Team All-Pros. This recognizes the firms' service to Fortune 100 clients. H&K ranked seventh on the list and is only one of eight firms to make the list for three of the last four years.
The consulting group ranks law firms based on interviews with 200 of the Fortune 100 corporate counsels. The aim of is to measure client satisfaction and strength of client relationships. The questions focus on client focus, value for the dollar, keeping clients informed, breadth of services, technical and international capabilities and unprompted communication.
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• John Cannon Homes was ranked 15th in Professional Builder magazine's list of the nation's 50 best companies to work for in the residential construction industry for 2004.
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