Tenants and potential diners may have to wait until next year to learn about new tenants opening up shop in Dallas’ beleaguered Victory Park.
Orlando-based Estein & Associates USA, which represents the owner of the multi-use district adjacent to American Airlines Center, said in May that it was working with Fort Worth-based Trademark Property to help revamp vacant shopping space.
Wednesday, the day after the W Dallas Victory Hotel announced that mainstays Craft Dallas restaurant and Ghostbar were closing, an executive with Estein described a full-scale revamping of the Victory Park game plan, with an eye toward more wallet-friendly options.
“We will work with design experts, traffic experts, parking experts. The city of Dallas is involved,” said Lance Fair, chief operating officer of Estein and vice president of Victory Park. “Then we’ll have our strategy.”
He said he hopes to be “pursuing tenants by the end of the year so we can make some announcements in the first half of 2013.”
New tenants could open in the second half of next year “and beyond,” he said.
The W said Tuesday that Craft, a North Texas expansion from celebrity chef Tom Colicchio, will be replaced by a more affordable restaurant called Cook Hall.
“The price point before, in all areas, was just too high,” said Fair. “That’s a fundamental concept that will carry through” as new tenants are selected.
For existing tenants, the rebirth can’t come soon enough.
“The question is when” will the development turn around, said Josh Babb, owner of Kenichi restaurant. “Hopefully, more sooner than later. We have a $3 million restaurant, in terms of the build-out. Hopefully, it’s going to pay off for us to be optimists.”
Kenichi, known for its contemporary Asian cuisine, opened in November 2007 and has consistently been profitable, Babb said.
Craft opened in 2006 to great fanfare. Ghostbar was an extension of a popular Las Vegas nightspot operated by the N9ne group.
Both were able to hold on even after their tony neighbors, including N9ne Steakhouse and Nove Italiano, folded up shop as locals balked at the prices and complained about parking.
Asked about business at Craft, Thomas Caramucci, general manager at the W Dallas, said “we are all thriving,” and added that restaurant traffic was good.
Different take
Colicchio had a different perspective.
“We would have preferred to have been very successful and have had a long run,” Colicchio said. “When you get into business with Ross Perot Jr. and Tom Hicks, you think things will go according to plan, but the whole thing went bust, and that was part of the problem.
“They’re trying to get things on track, but … it wasn’t working out for us or for them, and for us, having a restaurant only busy on weekends …
“People would actually come up and say, ‘Are your other restaurants busy? Because this one is slow.’ And you start wondering if this is a liability,” he said.
Mixed-beverage tax receipts from the state comptroller’s office show combined taxes at the hotel-run food and beverage operations, including Craft, the lobby bar and a bar by the pool, slipped by nearly 15 percent between May 2009 and May 2012. (In 2009, the hotel combined its food and drink outlets under one liquor license. Figures for Craft alone were not available.)
At Ghostbar, which operated as a tenant, mixed-drink tax receipts fell by nearly 76 percent from May 2007 to May 2012. Caramucci said the bar, which initially drew well-coiffed crowds, cut back its days and hours of operation about a year ago.
Ideas for change
At least one new restaurant opened this year — Shooters, a fast casual spot that opened in January in space vacated when La Condesa closed. Shooters serves drinks and tacos and represents Babb’s continued faith in Victory.
“It’s a billion-dollar development,” he said of Victory Park. “They’re not going to just let it go down.”
Sam Benoikken’s Medina restaurant is among the few still hanging on from Victory’s early days.
He said he has not heard from management about the future of the development, but he does have some ideas about what would help.
“The success of Victory Park depends on building a true neighborhood that consists of at least 3,000, 4,000 residents,” he said. “It must be mixed with people who can rent and buy, as in teachers, nurses, students, etc., along with any type of movie theater … or a special and well-known retailer such as H&M, for example. … This is the only way to bring traffic to the area.”
Benoikken will get his wish, in part. Construction on a new apartment building is set to begin this year.
Fair was coy about what kinds of tenants he plans to pursue but said “having great entertainment attractions,” such as a movie theater or bowling alley, “would be great for Victory.”
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