Mount Prospect looking beyond Bed Bath & Beyond, which is closing
Mount Prospect can boast strong reserves and revenues. One of the reasons is a rich and robust retail mix that includes such shopping centers as Mount Prospect Plaza, Golf Plaza I & II and the new Mount Prospect Pointe.
Yet there is one nagging source of worry: the future of Randhurst Village.
Randhurst has already lost one significant source of revenue with the closing of Carson Pirie Scott in 2018. And now, Bed Bath & Beyond, another major revenue generator, is closing.
Village Manager Michael Cassady said the village has been in contact with Randhurst's owner, DLC Management, but he does not yet have a definite date for the closing.
"We heard in April that they were going to be closing stores," Cassady said. "We just haven't been given a date."
The village is certainly paying close attention to the Randhurst situation. Mount Prospect's strategic action plan in its 2020 budget places a high priority on a "Randhurst Vacancy Strategy."
"The plot thickens, because Bed Bath & Beyond is owned by World Market, who is also part of Randhurst Village, and we have a concern for the longevity of that business as well," Cassady said.
Bed Bath & Beyond spokeswoman Jessica Joyce said in a statement the company is closing "a limited number of stores that no longer meet the standards our customers expect from us, including our Randhurst Mall location." Meanwhile, "we're giving our most popular stores a multi-million dollar facelift," she said.
With the state of retail today, Cassady said, finding larger players to fill the Carson's and Bed Bath & Beyond spaces promises to pose a challenge.
"It's more difficult today than ever before to find those larger tenants, so you're stuck with cutting up the space and getting smaller retail (businesses) in there," he said.
Still, he said, DLC is looking at the situation carefully. For example, it is identifying possible retailers and entertainment uses that could fill the Carson's space.
Not all is doom and gloom at the center. For one thing, Cassady said, "The outlots are very high-performing."
Revenues from Randhurst and other sales tax generators are important in a $133 million budget in which only about $20 million comes from property taxes.
In addition, the village has a special revenue fund for the Randhurst Business District, generated from sales, hotel/motel, entertainment, and food and beverage taxes, as well as from a separate business district tax for retail establishments within the district itself.
The expenditures are restricted to the reimbursement of redevelopment-related expenses under an agreement approved in 2009.
Carson's, Cassady said, generated upward of a quarter of a million dollars annually in revenue to the village. He said the village has adjusted by building in some cushion in its 2020 budget.
"We are projecting sales taxes very conservatively, because you just never know when you get a major player that decides to shut down," he said.
The shopping center, which began in 1962 as a mall and then in 2008 had its enclosed part demolished, was reborn in 2011 as an open-air shopping center with a significant dining/entertainment component. DLC Management is the village's largest property taxpayer, with $24 million in equalized assessed valuation.