Good things are growing in the Holland Town Center.
At the center of the plaza at 12330 James St., local nonprofit group Eighth Day Farm is cultivating 1.3 acres of asphalt into an urban garden. The group hopes to see a produce stand go up in July or August, where consumers can buy vegetables.
The thriving farm is a metaphor for the liveliness that developers hope the once-struggling mall will embody.
And it’s just one face of a visible transformation that the property is undergoing in the hands of the Virginia-based SugarOak Management, a property development firm. A major tenant, an independent Planet Fitness franchise, opens this week in 22,000 square feet of space. Harvest Antiques and Collectibles and Home Decor, a tenant at the center for 16 years, is moving to a more desirable location.
The Holland Town Center is in the third year of a roughly five-year turnaround plan, according to Town Center spokesman Drew Durham. The signs of progress are easy to see.
From pavement to vegetables
“We’re growing a variety of things,” said Jeff Roessing, farm manager and sole full-time employee of Eighth Day Farm. Besides a small number of strawberries, “it’s pretty much all annual vegetables, with a few herbs.”
Roessing said that the Holland Town Center requested the partnership and paid for most of the materials needed to - in reverse of the familiar song - produce a gardener’s paradise where someone else had already put up a parking lot. Eighth Day Farm, which farms at a total of three sites in the Holland area, is now seeking to further develop the Town Center farm. The farm is seeking to raise $16,000 in donations through the social media funding website kickstarter.com.
Originally called the Holland Outlet Center, the property was purchased in July 2009 for $2.8 million by SugarOak Management, according to Holland Township records.
The owner will have invested an additional $2.75 million in the property by the end of 2012, according to Durham. Besides the cost of carrying the property, the money was spent on improvements to the buildings and site and tenant improvements.
Mixed-use projects
“It’s a big job remodeling and improving over 200,000 square feet,” Durham said. A new access road built in 2010 provided closer access to shops on the west side of the open-air mall. The company also has begun rebuilding the building facades throughout the mall. One is finished and another is being completed.
The new owners’ vision is for a mixed-use property, and they’ve attracted a spectrum of tenants. Lakeshore Electric Cars and Golf Carts and Cassidy Rae Studio, a hair salon, rank among the most recent tenants, Durham said. Existing tenants like West Michigan Flooring and Harvest Antiques & Collectibles & Home Decor are relocating or expanding.
Harvest Antiques is preparing to move to a better location, after operating as an antique mall for 16 years in the Holland Town Center.
In the past, they had to compensate for an out-of-the-way location by advertising campaigns, said manager Dave Rosenberger.
“We’ve done fine and we’ve made it through the bad times, but this should be a shot in the arm,” he said. The new location by the Center’s pond, visible from restaurants, is highly desirable.
“For pretty much the first time in eight years, we’re going to have walk-by traffic,” Rosenberger said.
About Holland Town Center
If you would like more information about Holland Town Center, please contact Drew Durham at 616 566-2039or go to www.hollandtowncenter.com
About SugarOak
SugarOak is a full service real estate company offering investment, management, and construction services across multiple property types. Headquartered in Herndon, Virginia, SugarOak has ownership interests and management portfolios across the US and Canada.
