Doing business in a construction zone has become business as usual at Capital Mall.
Jefferson City's largest retail hub has seen roughly a third of the exterior improvements in store for it about a year after Farmer Holding Company, which purchased the mall in late 2012, shared details of a tentative laundry list of planned improvements.
"What you see over there now is about 30 percent of the total improvements that we will have done by the end of (this) year," Rob Kingsbury of Farmer Holding Company told the News Tribune. "2015 was a really important year for us; we've made a lot of improvements. 2016 is going to be equally or more so important as far as the improvements we're going to make."
The Jefferson City Council approved a Tax Increment Financing (TIF) district and Community Improvement District (CID) in 2013 to help fund redevelopment of the mall, which officials determined was a blighted area. The complete renovation project was estimated at a cost of $36 million, with a projected $15.6 million to come in sales tax revenues from the TIF and CID.
The TIF does not impose any additional taxes, but allows for a portion of sales taxes generated on the property to be used to repay the costs of redevelopment - an estimated $10.6 million over 23 years. The CID added a 1 percent sales tax to items purchased on the property, which will raise roughly $5 million over 40 years.
"We started working on the renovation the day after we purchased the property in 2012. It just took us almost two years to figure out what needed to be done, come up with a plan and then start the physical improvements at the beginning of "15," Kingsbury said.
The November 2014 announcement that national retailer Ross Dress for Less would open a new 24,000-square-foot store between Capital Mall's JCPenney and Sears wings spurred a starting point for the renovation.
"They had very specific improvements that they needed not only for the inside of their space, but also on the outside. So to meet their time frame, we started the exterior improvements for the entire property in front of Ross," Kingsbury said.
Ross Dress for Less, which opened last October, required a newly constructed outside entrance with a stonework facade that Kingsbury said will be "related to" the transformation Farmer Holding Company has planned for the mall's other main entrances. He estimated all five main entrances will be revamped by the end of 2016.
The Ross department store also offered a jumping-off point for parking lot improvements - repaving and constructing landscaping islands to be planted later this year.
"The islands are important for us to make sure that it is as safe as possible traffic flow-wise out there. But it's also for us to have a place to be able to plant grass and trees," Kingsbury said.
Parking lot work has been completed on the northern and western sides of the JCPenney building and around the Sears building, leaving the mall's southern and eastern sides to complete this year.
If it seems like progress on the parking lot stalled in late 2015, there's a reason.
"Most of our leases restrict us from doing any work on the run-up to Thanksgiving through the first week of January," Kingsbury said. "So even if during that whole period of time it was 80 degrees and sunny, we still would have to stop our work basically at the end of October because they don't want a bunch of work and chaos going on during their busiest shopping period."
Capital Mall stepped up its self-promotion with two new pylon signs last summer - a 36-foot sign at the mall's entrance near Hy-Vee and a 50-foot sign facing U.S. 50 from the back of the Hardee's property on South Country Club Drive.
That leaves some TLC for the mall's 1970s-original brick as the last major box to check on the exterior improvements list.
"When we're finished, the entire exterior of the property is going to look modern, including the brick," Kingsbury said. "We feel like once we modernize the entrances, clean the exterior, address the parking lot, the landscaping, we're going to have a safer center and one that's more aesthetically pleasing."
With exterior improvements as first priority, changes to the mall's interior are set to follow in the second half of 2016 into 2017.
"You've got to do the exterior improvements first so people know that things are happening," Kingsbury said. "The exterior improvements, even though it took us so long to plan, there's really a finite number of things you can do. ... The interior plan is taking more time because inside there is an infinite number of things that we could do."
While the interior improvement plan remains in the works, Kingsbury said it will include upgrades to lighting and storefronts as well as revamping the children's play area, which was relocated to the food court from the center court.
Mall officials call timing of three stores' departure coincidental
Capital Mall started its second year of major exterior improvements amid the loss of three major tenants. Kirlin's Hallmark, one of the Jefferson City mall's original stores that opened in 1978, closed Jan. 3; American Eagle closed Jan. 24; and Pro Image Sports has announced plans to close Feb. 11.
The timing is coincidental, said Capital Mall General Manager Jamie Reed, who noted the mall's occupancy rate was 88 percent at the end of 2015, up from 79 percent when Farmer Holding Company bought the mall in December 2012.
Reed also dispelled the idea some have circulated that the stores' closings were a result of high rent fees.
"That's just a rumor. There's no truth to that," Reed said, adding all three stores closed due to corporate restructuring in their brands. "I can honestly say for all three of the stores that are closing, if we gave them free rent, they still would have closed."
Capital Mall has welcomed 16 new tenants - totaling 71,998 square feet of retail space - since 2012, including national chain rue21; Downtown Book and Toy's second location; and Xtreme Trendz and Slackers CD's and Games, which both relocated from elsewhere in Jefferson City.
It has also lost a few tenants along the way, like Deb Shops and RadioShack, whose national brands both filed for bankruptcy.
In addition to recruiting new retailers, attracting community events like charity fundraisers, musical performances and children's activities has also been a priority.
"We're trying to do anything and everything we can to make people want to come to the mall," Kingsbury said. "We want them to come to the mall because it's a fun place, an enjoyable place, and a family place to be, not because they need a new pair of socks and they're going to run here and grab them."
Between its community room and center court, Capital Mall hosted 75 events in 2015, up from about 50 in 2014 and 40 in 2013.
"There was really nothing going on like that before we got it," Reed said. "It's really important to us to build that community relationship and give families and individuals things to do and a place to do them."