In a retail expansion blitz that continues unabated in Edmonton, big-box stores are now setting their “sites” on the city’s northwest sector.

Best Buy, Sears Whole Home, Staples and Petsmart are just some of the retailers staking ground on the land available just off 137th Avenue. Most will be locating in the seven-block, 27-acre Skyview Power Centre, which is about to open its third and final phase in August.

Others will be opening their doors in the adjacent North City shopping centre, now under new management and undergoing a major facelift and expansion.

This comes on top of continuing construction and new store openings at Canada’s largest power centre, South Edmonton Common, and modest growth in Edmonton’s 170th Street power corridor – an area that includes West Edmonton Mall.

The Keg restaurant, above, is one of several new tenants at the Skyview Power Centre (below right).

With its first two phases fully leased, Skyview’s third segment will see the power centre grow to encompass the entire strip of land between 133rd Street and 140th Street.

New Skyview tenants include Best Buy with its third Edmonton store – it just opened its first two Alberta stores in April – and Sears Whole Home, which is unwrapping its first city location in South Edmonton Common.

Saan, busy rolling out its new clothing and hard goods concept across the country, Petsmart and The Keg, with its prototype for the future – a larger 8,100-sq.-ft. restaurant combining wood and stone to provide a modern mountain chalet feel – round out the tenants.



Openings will be staggered throughout this fall, except for The Keg, which will welcome its first patrons in early 2004.

They join a mix of 18 big- and junior-box tenants that already includes Pier 1, Home Outfitters, Michael’s, Winners, Sport Mart and Urban Barn. There are also 15 pad or commercial retail units occupied by companies such as Starbucks and Tim Horton Donuts, along with Edmonton’s only Don Cherry’s Restaurant.

Meanwhile, HomeSense, a home-furnishings concept from Winners that offers brand-name home fashions at discount prices, has a location secured in Skyview’s second phase and will open in February 2004 when it rolls out a wave of stores across Edmonton and Calgary. For distribution reasons, HomeSense is waiting until it has a sufficient store mass before opening its doors in the province.

“If you looked at Skyview four years ago, you would never have expected it to do as well as it has,” said Neil MacGillivray, president of 718721 Alberta Ltd., the company behind the North City renovations.

In fact, Skyview’s success and lack of space for additional expansion has left MacGillivray with a problem other developers would envy. “We have more offers to lease than we have space,” he said.

MacGillivray, whose company bought North City for $6.5 million in February, is pouring a minimum of $4 million into the property as part of the upgrade process. He has already attracted Staples, taking over the space once occupied by Food For Less, and is in the process of adding two national tenants not currently represented on the city’s north side. Sources indicate that one will likely be Linens N’ Things but, as deals are still pending, MacGillivray would not comment.

Skyview’s origin dates back to 1997 and excess Home Depot land that led to the power centre’s development, said retail specialist Roy Rolheiser.

“Home Depot had residual land in front of their store that they sold to the Staburn Property Group, which operates out of Vancouver,” said Rolheiser, a partner in Avison Young, the company that became Staburn’s land assembler and leasing agent for the project.

“That space was quickly leased to tenants like ATB, Burger King and Don Cherry’s,” said Rolheiser.

“At the same time, other larger tenants had expressed an interest, although the interest wasn’t really strong. They said this development would be a lot more interesting if it was larger – Winners was the one that made that impression on the developer and ourselves.

“With that in mind, Staburn acquired the land, which formed the balance of Phase I, and ongoing demand from other tenants caused the developer to acquire all the land up to Leon’s on 140 Street,” said Rolheiser.

A key to the Skyview’s success is its ability to draw from the neighbouring city of St. Albert market, said Rolheiser. “The St. Albert market is a terrific market both because of its size and its average household income for 2003, which is projected at $88,000.”

Paul Messinger, director of the University of Alberta’s Canadian Institute of Retailing and Services, added: “This power centre is strategically located.

“It’s on the opposite side of Edmonton from South Edmonton Common. For the segment of Edmonton that is growing north and northwest, they don’t have to drive into the centre of the city or west out to 170th Street,” said Messinger, who also points to the upscale market draw of St. Albert.

Another factor working in Skyview’s favour is the shape of the property.

“It is very linear, stretched across the north side of 137th Avenue,” said Rolheiser. “The frontage is close to one-half of a mile, and what that does is, it lets all the tenants feel that they’re front-row centre, and because only the north side of the avenue is developed, when traffic moves east or west, their focus is to the north.”