This cycle has been the best run of my real estate career. It’s a cycle that has had a focus on live, work, play. Most large corporate moves have focused on locations that can provide a live, work, play environment—a walkable environment. I understand why an employer would want the best situation to keep their existing employees happy, as well as create an environment where they can recruit the best possible future employees as their company grows. In my view, the live, work, play location has been 80 percent focused on locations that provide multiple good food options for the employees. In my view, I think providing great quality food options for employees is a good thing!
We have all been forced to eat marginal food for years because of convenience. Most convenient options provide limited menus and food options that no one was excited to eat. But, as I watch this huge influx of restaurants into the retail surrounding office projects, I just can’t help but think we are way overdoing the restaurant aspect of most developments.
I expect there to be considerable fallout amongst restaurants. Many of these restaurants will not survive, producing a retail environment where the best options flourish but many of the other options fail, creating a revolving door of concepts trying to compete. The positive of this could be that the space gets converted to more useful support retail that improves the tenant experience. The negative could be a large percent of restaurants that struggle, creating a fair amount of vacant restaurant spaces that may never lease to another restaurant as the market settles down and focuses on the best options.
As the market slows down, it will be interesting to see how this all plays out. The good news is the tenants will have plenty of good options. It just might be too much of a good thing!
Bill Cawley is CEO of Cawley Partners.
