The Strength of the Gulf South
I wanted to share a PowerPoint I recently presented at a meeting highlighting the strength of the Gulf South. In recent years, the Gulf South has been gaining the Nation’s attention and rising to the top of many National Rankings. Activity in the Gulf South is driven by achievements in a variety of areas, must notably Energy/Oil & Gas Production, Chemical Processing, Aerospace, IT & Digital Media, the New Orleans BioDistrict and Coastal Restoration.
When you look at the entire picture of what is happening down here – from the LNG facilities in Lake Charles, Airbus in Mobile, the IBM announcement in Baton Rouge, the medical corridor in New Orleans, and the activity in the IT sector and coastal restoration – it is an amazing picture. Truly. Nowhere else in the country is this level of activity occurring.
Click the image below to view the presentation.
President’s Message: It’s a New Day in New Orleans!
Last week, we celebrated the Grand Opening of Mid-City Market in New Orleans. This Winn-Dixie anchored, urban shopping center is a milestone for Stirling Properties, as it’s our largest ground-up shopping center development in the City of New Orleans in our company’s 37 year history! It also represents one of the most significant retail developments in New Orleans since Hurricane Katrina, taking once blighted and vacant properties and returning them to commerce. This project creates over 500 new jobs and generates projected annual retail sales of over $61 Million.
Mid-City Market is the culmination of over 4 years of work and it was a challenge to put (and keep) all the pieces together. Few companies could take on a project of this complexity and succeed, but Stirling Properties was up for this challenge.
I want to commend our incredible team who worked on this project for a job well done! There were many points in time where it looked like the deal was dead, but our Stirling team worked diligently to complete it. It was through their hard work and perseverance that this inner-city project materialized.
I also want to commend Mayor Mitch Landrieu for his vision and leadership and Councilwoman Susan Guidry for her incredible support and drive to help make this a reality for Mid-City.
The Mid-City Market project is a result of over $40 Million in private investment and demonstrates our strong belief in the City of New Orleans and the civic and business leadership which has created an environment where businesses are confident to invest. A plethora of national and regional rankings paint a truly remarkable picture of New Orleans as THE city on the move, which is in stark contrast to previous decades.
This project, combined with our other projects completed to date, brings Stirling’s investments to over $120 Million in the City of New Orleans in just the last 3 years. All of us at Stirling Properties are confident in the direction of New Orleans, and Mid-City Market shows our continued commitment to the market. This project was the first for us in many ways and certainly will not be the last.
Mobile, Alabama Garners International Attention
I wanted to share this article from Mobile’s Press-Register, “Mobile Chamber President: Area Must Capitalize on ‘Great Window of Opportunity’ after 2013 Paris Air Show,” that highlights how Mobile is now seen internationally as a new center for aviation and aerospace.
It is a great article about the surging Mobile, Alabama market and it underscores the reasons why Stirling is opening an office there this year. This office will not only serve this growing economy, but also anchor the eastern side of the Interstate 10 corridor for us.
Will Barrois, our Vice President and Regional Manager for Alabama and Florida added, “The future of Mobile is bright and the area is poised for growth. Our active customer base is looking forward to us expanding our presence there.”
Louisiana Tops Nation for Most Engaged Workers
There is not only a very interesting, but very important article about a Gallup study which was recently published.
Louisiana ranked #1 in the nation for states whose workers were most engaged in their jobs – meaning they are inolved in and enthusiastic about their work. Not only is this a feel-good story, but it also has significant underlying implications for new businesses looking to locate here. Worker satisfaction, engagement, and quality of life tied to the cost of living makes our state a very desirable place to do business. When you add this accolade to the many others that have come out lately, we are definitely a place of the future .
From a personal point of view, I know that our team at Stirling is actively engaged and contributing at the highest levels on all fronts.
President’s Message: What Happens in Vegas Doesn’t Stay in Vegas!
Last month’s International Council of Shopping Center’s (ICSC’s) RECon 2013 in Las Vegas was very encouraging. Overall attendance for the retail real estate industry’s biggest annual global event was over 35,000, a 10 percent increase from 2012 and a post-Recession record. Attendees and exhibitors, including retailers, developers, lenders and brokers, expressed optimism about the health of the U.S. retail real estate industry. I also noticed more young people coming into the industry, a trend I haven’t seen in many years…or maybe I’m just getting old.
It was quite obvious to me that everyone at the convention was more relaxed, but busier than in recent years. Our Stirling team had a full slate of productive meetings for all our properties, and we were all touting the strength of the Gulf South market. There was significant interest in our current development projects – Mid-City Market that will open next month in New Orleans, Fremaux Town Center under development in Slidell, and our recently announced Magnolia Marketplace project in New Orleans. We expect to finalize many deals from our meetings for these and other properties.
[wpvideo 0nNAm2jd]Another exciting development at Stirling Properties is the opening of our new office in Mobile, Alabama! Our new office will help us to expand our presence in the region in an area that is experiencing exponential growth. You will be hearing more specifics about this in the very near future!
The window of opportunity is definitely open for us now and we are all working hard to take advantage of this momentum. What happens in Vegas doesn’t stay in Vegas – it will produce positive outcomes for us at Stirling and the Gulf South. Stay tuned for more news!
Forbes ranks New Orleans #3 for Information Technology Jobs
In a recent Forbes article, “The Cities Winning the Battle for Information Jobs,” author and researcher Joel Kotkin ranks Greater New Orleans as #3 in the USA, behind only technology heavyweights Silicon Valley and San Francisco. In the article, he states “Perhaps the most dramatic player is third-place New Orleans-Metairie-Kenner, where information employment is up 28% since 2009”. The information sector in metro New Orleans “is very broad-based, including companies in digital effects, videogames, software development as well as a burgeoning film and television industry,” writes Kotkin. “The recent decision by General Electric to place its new technology center and its 300 new technology jobs in New Orleans is another sign of the Crescent City’s emergence as a viable information hub.” Additionally, when you consider the recent announcement of IBM in Baton Rouge, it is even more impressive for our super region in general.
Based on the employment growth in the IT sector over the long-term (2001-2012), mid-term (2007-2012) and the last two years, as well as momentum, the Top Ten Tech metros are:
- Silicon Valley
- San Francisco
- New Orleans
- Bostom
- Austin
- Atlanta
- San Antonia
- Raleigh
- Phoenix
- Nashville
You can read the entire article, including more detail on the methodology, here.
