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The mall business model has been “turned upside-down,” but Tanglewood Mall is making major efforts to overcome those challenges.
As a teenager, a trip to Tanglewood Mall was a treat for Jill Loope.
Loope and her family would make the approximately one-hour trek from the New River Valley to the Roanoke County shopping center, where they’d find such stores and restaurants as John Norman, Lazarus and Orange Julius, a favorite for Loope.
She remembers buying a fur coat at Lazarus, a former department store chain.
“It was always a big weekend when we came to Tanglewood Mall,” says Loope, who now is director of economic development for Roanoke County. “Those were great days and great times and great experiences.”
What Loope and many longtime Roanoke area residents remember is the Tanglewood of yesteryear. Built in 1973, Tanglewood was the premier retail hub of the Roanoke Valley and Southwest Virginia. It debuted with J.C.Penney, Miller & Rhodes, Leggett’s and more.
But over time, Tanglewood lost its preeminence. Valley View Mall opened in 1985, taking over a large piece of farmland facing I-581. National retail chains and large anchor stores flocked to the center, which now stretches to approximately 844,000 square feet.
Meanwhile, at Tanglewood throughout the past 20 years, stores left, anchor retailers dropped off and the shopping center became what many considered a dead mall.
Fast-forward to today. Tanglewood is making a comeback — but it’s a different one of sorts.
In the past few months, construction crews have built several outparcel buildings in the mall parking lot. These buildings now house Chipotle, Panda Express, Jersey Mike’s Subs, Blaze Pizza and Aspen Dental.
The mall’s owner, Blackwater Resources, also has announced plans to build a Chili’s Grill & Bar restaurant in another outparcel space.
Last fall, Carilion Clinic moved its pediatric practices into 75,000 square feet at Tanglewood, taking over one of the mall’s anchor spaces that formerly housed J.C.Penney. Shortly after that, Chicken Salad Chick, a restaurant franchise based in Alabama, opened near Carilion.
Additionally, in March, Blackwater announced plans for Burlington Department Store, formerly Burlington Coat Factory, to open in November inside half of the space formerly occupied by Stein Mart.
John Abernathy, president of Blackwater, said Burlington will relocate to Tanglewood from its current Hershberger Road location in Roanoke. There are plans to fill the second half of the Stein Mart space as well, he says. Burlington will take 26,000 square feet.
“Our goal is to add more businesses and offer more services to the community and make it a much livelier center,” Abernathy says.
Blackwater, a real estate investment, acquisition and development firm in Alabama, purchased Tanglewood in 2016.
“We bought an extremely well-located property that had tons of potential, but it had not changed very much in years,” Abernathy says. “Our goal was to leverage the well-located attributes of the property and to add a mix of uses to make it busy again.”
The additions are already drawing new clientele to the Tanglewood area. On a recent Sunday afternoon, Heather and Drew Bowman of Roanoke ate lunch at the newly-opened Jersey Mike’s Subs.
“It’s good to see a little more life,” says Heather Bowman of the additions to the mall.
The couple says they are happy to see a wider variety of businesses land at the shopping center.
“We wanted to have people visiting the site on a daily basis,” Abernathy says. “It’s just giving choice to the area that has not been there before.”
Some of the store owners inside the mall say they are seeing increased customer traffic, particularly since Carilion landed at Tanglewood. Carilion Children’s Tanglewood Center offers 14 practices and services, from general pediatrics to imaging services. Daily the practice draws an average of 500 patients and a total of 1,000 to 1,500 patients, staff, and family members, according to Carilion Clinic.
Since Star City Sports Collectibles relocated to Tanglewood from Townside Festival Center in Roanoke earlier this year, the store has seen a notable increase in foot traffic and clothing sales, says owner John LaTempa. The traffic includes families browsing the mall stores.
“The more [businesses] they put in here, the better we will do,” LaTempa says.
Even so, the mall’s second level remains largely empty, except for Carilion offices and a Mommy Time childcare business, which also has been busier since Carilion moved in, says owner Enka Tsend.
Similar to Tanglewood, the kinds of businesses filling shopping centers nowadays are not the traditional retail mix. Service businesses, often health care-oriented, are some of the most common.
That’s because nationally many shopping centers are seeking businesses that will lease large spaces formerly occupied by department stores, says Mark Hunter, who is managing director of retail asset services for CBRE, a commercial real estate services and investment firm.
“The mall business model has been turned upside down,” he says, explaining that malls were founded long ago on the success of department stores.
Because of changes over time in consumer shopping habits and competition from discount retailers, department store chains are taking some big hits. Health care and other non-retail tenants find these large mall spaces attractive because they don’t have to build a new building, and they can be situated close to their customers, Hunter says.
Finding large chunks of vacant land for building in the Roanoke Valley already is a challenge, said Krista Vannoy, vice president and chief operating officer at Waldvogel Commercial Properties in Roanoke.
At Tanglewood, which sits on 58.6 acres, “taking some of that pavement that’s sitting there and turning it into some new buildings that generate activity, I think that’s a positive,” she says.
Tanglewood’s location, just off U.S. 220, makes it a prime gateway to many parts of the Roanoke region.
“The property does have a whole lot of importance to the community,” Vannoy says.
The development of Tanglewood Mall fits into Roanoke County’s long-term plans for a 419 Town Center, which would connect the commercial corridor along Rt. 419 into a pedestrian-friendly hub of retail, housing, restaurants and more.
“The vision was designed to be a catalyst for renewing the energy and enthusiasm in this corridor and to enhance our commercial offerings, to give developers and property owners confidence,” Loope says.
As the corridor’s anchor, Tanglewood Mall’s success is vital, she said, adding that investment leads to more investment.
Even so, Loope cautions people to keep an open mind to Tanglewood’s changes. The mall will not be the same shopping center that it was long ago.
“You’re dealing with market realities,” she says. “The economy changes, markets change, so do retailers and so do commercial properties. It’s not the same kind of traditional view of what we will remember shopping there back in the day.”
The story above is from our May/June 2022. For more stories, subscribe today or view our FREE digital edition. Thank you for supporting local journalism!