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Shopping Centers Today -> August 2001
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MUTUAL FUND FIRM BULLISH ON DENVER CENTER
By Donna Mitchell
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| The Berger Funds investment center at Denver’s Cherry Creek Shopping Center is the first to be located in a mall’s common area. |
Denver’s Cherry Creek Shopping Center rolled out a distinctive welcome mat to its patrons earlier this year — a full-service interactive investment center.
In March, locally based Berger Funds unveiled a mutual fund investment center at the upscale super-regional mall, bringing a new dimension to the term “walk-in investment center.”
Company officials hope to provide mutual fund services — Berger’s specialty — to some of the 15 million people who pass through the center every year.
“To provide enhanced visibility was important, and Cherry Creek mall is very visible. It is always one of the top five tourist attractions of the City of Denver,” said Sally Caralton, spokeswoman for Berger Funds.
Despite its location in the common area, the investor center is a permanent, not a temporary, tenant and is designed to be an added benefit to shopping there, said Lisa Herzlich, spokeswoman for Cherry Creek’s management.
“We’ve seen reasonable amounts of money flow in, in terms of new accounts,” Caralton said, but declined to reveal how much those accounts represent in dollar figures. “The real benefit is the visibility that it provides us. Given what was happening in the market, we would not see a huge amount of money come in right away.”
According to Caralton, the investor center has become an information hub, where people walking by stop to talk with sales representatives about the markets.
“It fits perfectly in the demographic pocket of the mall. People go [to that section of the mall] to relax, spend time and take a break,” she said.
Not only will the investor center benefit from Cherry Creek Shopping Center’s traffic, but from passersby at Cherry Creek North, an outdoor shopping and entertainment center located across the street that features smaller boutiques, galleries and cafes.
“It is at the crossroads, so people will pass them either way,” Herzlich said. Shoppers often walk back and forth between the enclosed Cherry Creek mall and the outdoor center.
The walk-in center can meet the needs of all investors, from the neophyte to the seasoned shareholder. There are two full-time sales representatives able to help patrons open accounts, buy or add shares to existing portfolios, move around shares between its family of funds, sell stocks and explore the company’s Web site. Also, investors can get timely information through television broadcasts of the Cable News Network, the Financial Network News and a stock ticker, Herzlich said.
Communication Arts of Boulder, Colo., the architect, designed the investment center to attract shoppers inside with an open exterior. As many as six people can walk through the entrance at once, but at the same time there are little cubicles that allow private discussions between sales representatives and clients, she said.
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For Cherry Creek Shopping Center, as well as Berger Funds, the idea seemed logical for several reasons. For starters, the mall and the mutual fund company both cater to affluent residents in the Denver area. Owned by Taubman Centers, Cherry Creek Shopping Center is anchored by Neiman Marcus, Foley’s and Lord & Taylor, and attracts a well-heeled crowd with stores like DKNY and Tiffany & Co.
Berger Funds has also raised its profile in the city by collaborating with the mall on several community-service programs. The Mask Project for one, raises money for the Hospice of Metro Denver by selling ceramic masks painted by celebrities, Herzlich said.
The Berger Funds is not the first brokerage to begin operating in a shopping center; several mall owners have included them as in-line tenants. And adding another innovation to the practice is Web-based brokerage E-Trade of Menlo Park, Calif., which announced in April that it had agreed to put 20 E-Trade shops and more than 1,000 automated teller machines into Target and Target Greatland stores nationwide. The shops are 400-square-foot facilities within Target stores, and come staffed with sales and service representatives.
But what distinguishes the Berger Funds investor center from those currently operating in other malls is that it was the first to go into a common area, Cherry Creek Shopping Center officials say.
Market participants agree it’s a good idea.
“Brokerages should be integrated into the tenant mix [of malls]. The U.S. is the furthest behind any nation” when it comes to that, said Stanley Eichelbaum, SCMD, president of Cincinnati-based Marketing Developments, a retail development consulting firm. Eichelbaum mentioned that some malls currently being planned in Latin America call for an entire financial services corridor or court, where all the banks, brokerages and automated teller machines would be grouped together.
Placing an investment center in the middle of a bevy of spending outlets doesn’t send conflicting messages to consumers about money management. Quite the opposite, said Norman Kranzdorf, chairman of Kramont Realty Trust, a Plymouth Meeting, Pa.-based developer.
“It’s prudent that people have a balanced approach to their money,” he said. “Cherry Creek is especially that way; people can do both [invest and spend], and they should.”
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