Gloria M. Taylor smiles with satisfaction as she watches dozens of bubbles float into the air to celebrate the grand opening of The Shops at White Oak Village in eastern Henrico. Taylor lives in the Fairfield District of the county, not far from the new retail center.
“This means a lot to me,” she says. “I don’t have to go all the way across town to shop. This new center is beautiful. It’s marvelous.”
Formerly the site of the Viasystems manufacturing facility, the 136-acre parcel of land was recycled and transformed into a first-class shopping center by Henrico-based Pruitt Associates and Forest City Enterprises of Cleveland, Ohio.
Emerick Corsi, executive vice president of Forest City Commercial Development, stood in the midst of the demolition of the manufacturing facility back in March 2007, surrounded by 7,500 tons of aluminum, steel, iron and copper. “We had a vision of something bigger,” he says. “This was a transformation of concrete, brick and steel.”
The opening of The Shops at White Oak Village marks the beginning of a new era in eastern Henrico as well as the continuation of a growing retail presence in the county. The landmark project that fueled the retail boom was the Short Pump Town Center in the far western section of Henrico. That project was also spearheaded by Pruitt and Forest City.
The 1.3-million-square-foot mall opened on Sept. 4, 2003. The scope of the project attracted high-end national retailers like Nordstrom, which until the mall opening, had no presence in central Virginia. Currently, approximately 44 percent of Short Pump Town Center’s more than 140 shops and restaurants are unique to the market; 80 percent are national chains. In spring 2009, the mall will mark not only the grand opening of the upscale Hotel Sierra but the addition of more shops.
Short Pump Town Center is also unique in design. Its outdoor, pedestrian-friendly village concept was a first in Henrico. Tommy Pruitt, manager of Pruitt Associates, remembers early discussions about the concept and concerns that shopping might be affected by the weather.
“It was a gamble that summers and winters wouldn’t be too severe,” he says, noting that weather hasn’t deterred shoppers from flocking to the outdoor mall. “It’s gone over well.”
Research into open-air shopping centers has shown that customers spend more time in an open-air setting than in an enclosed shopping mall. In fact, the Main Street environment at the Town Center has been a big draw for consumers.
Misty Parsons, Short Pump’s director of marketing, believes the mall has been important to Henrico in many ways. “Not only has the Town Center created jobs for the county, but it has also created a sense of place or central point for the community,” she says. “It has also been a tax generator for the county and has helped prevent sales tax leakage — shoppers driving outside of Henrico County to shop.”
Malls such as Short Pump Town Center and the new Shops at White Oak Village add to the county’s nationally known quality of life. “We are in the business of drawing companies in, and the major thing they are looking for is quality of life,” says Leonard Cake of the Henrico County Economic Development Authority. “When you have nationally known stores like Nordstrom, it means that this is a good place to be.”
The attractive mix of national and local tenants at Short Pump Town Center, along with the opening of Route 288, have worked like a magnet to pull in shoppers from as far away as Charlottesville, Fredericksburg, Williamsburg and Virginia Beach — drives of two hours or more. “There was a pent-up demand for a major shopping center out there,” Cake says. “Short Pump did a lot of work on the demographics. They knew they had a draw with all of the residential and commercial developments out there.”
