Supermarket/Grocery

When the International Council of Shopping Centers opens the doors of the Las Vegas Convention Center on May 18 to shopping center attendees from around the globe, it will unveil a lineup of newly built and redeveloped properties ripe for deal-making.

On the following pages, Chain Store Age highlights five projects that will be on display at RECon 2014.

Hassalo on Eighth

Portland, Ore.

Developer: American Assets Trust

Canada no longer top priority for U.S. retail expansion

During the past few years, U.S. and international retailers have flocked to Canada in the hunt for top-line growth as store portfolios matured in the United States and there were fewer opportunities for expansion. In fact, many U.S. retailers considered Canada to be an extension of their domestic businesses due to the similarities and close proximity to their home offices.

San Francisco - Revel Systems, has introduced a new hardware and software product bundle aimed at providing technology features for the visually impaired. The inherent touch-screen nature of iPad POS terminals are without tactile qualities, making them not fully accessible and independently usable by the visually impaired.

The timing of the Easter holiday this year adversely affected first-quarter sales at Publix by 1.3% — Easter fell in the second quarter this year, rather than the first quarter as if did last year — but the company still posted a 4.1% increase to $7.8 billion from last year’s $7.5 billion.

Comparable-store sales for the quarter increased 4%.

Sweaty Betty

There’s a new high-end fashion activewear brand in town, and this one speaks with a British accent. London-based Sweaty Betty opened its first two U.S outposts last year, one in Manhattan’s SoHo neighborhood, and one in Greenwich, Conn. A third is expected to open in 2014.

In general, the top acquirers of 2013 logged big gains over 2012

Editor’s Note: The 25th annual Chain Store Age survey of Fastest-Growing Acquirers surveyed retail square footage purchased during the 2013 calendar year.

Lenders are lending again, the equity markets are investing again, and buyers and sellers appear to be moving retail real estate faster than last year — which was a relatively good recovery year.

New retail space in 2013 was once again heavy on redevelopment, expansion and outlet centers

Year five and, once again, too few square feet in ground-up shopping center construction to rank the “Fastest-Growing Developers” as has been the Chain Store Age tradition for the 20 years prior.

Today, developers seem fated to redevelop and expand existing centers, develop 300,000-sq.-ft. to 600,000-sq.-ft. outlet centers and perhaps add an occasional grocery-anchored infill center.

Pleasanton, Calif. - Prepaid payment network Blackhawk Network (Canada) Ltd. has launched its digital platform in the Canadian market, by offering Blackhawk's gift card products to Rogers' customers in the new Suretap wallet application. The application allows customers to safely store eligible payment and gift cards on their smartphones and make purchases directly from the phone by holding it up to contactless payment terminals.