Target To Open In San Francisco's Metreon
Friday, November 19, 2010 Andrew S. Ross
This artist's rendering shows how the Metreon will change. The center will be completely remodeled to accommodate Target on the second floor. Photo: SF Redevelopment Agency / SF Redevelopment Agency
Welcome to Target's first San Francisco store. And, oh, by the way, a dramatically new-looking Metreon.
Assuming all goes according to plan, the City Target store, taking up the Metreon's second floor, should be ready by early 2012. It will be complemented by a "visually inviting" 470-seat dining terrace overlooking Yerba Buena Gardens, oodles more outlets, and a 10- to 14-foot-tall sculpture at the corner of Fourth and Howard streets.
Those are some of the features itemized by the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency, which gave its final nod to the project this week, a mere year after Target first talked to the building's landlord, Westfield Metreon, about moving in there.
The 85,000-square-foot store is considerably smaller than Target's average of 175,000 square feet. It's one of the first of the Minneapolis company's urban-centered stores, similar to those other chains - like Whole Foods Markets, British supermarket Tesco and Wal-Mart - are opening in the Bay Area and across the country.
"We believe there is a compelling opportunity to open smaller stores of about 60,000 square feet to 100,000 square feet, with a reduced, optimized assortment, when larger sites simply aren't available," a Target spokeswoman told Dow Jones this month.
For the Metreon, it's an opportunity to "transform an underperforming asset into a successful shopping destination ... and generate significant economic activity as a result," according to a Redevelopment Agency memo presented at this week's meeting.
Westfield is betting on it, investing an estimated $25 million to $30 million in the changes, which it expects will generate approximately 775 construction jobs and up to 300 permanent jobs with new tenants, other than Target.
Target has said it will be looking to hire up to 250 people. According to the Redevelopment Agency memo, Target is projecting $120,000 in annual payroll taxes, a minimum of $5.4 million in annual sales taxes, and about $1 million in additional parking revenue for the Fifth and Mission Street Garage.
Now, about that second San Francisco Target store planned for the largely abandoned shopping complex at Geary and Masonic, date TBA ...
They're gaining on us: San Francisco, as you may have read in The Business section on Wednesday, has a new program, BioSF, created to bring more Chinese companies to the city's biotech hub in Mission Bay.
Those involved in the effort might want to peruse a report, "China, the Life Sciences Leader of 2020," released this week by Monitor, a Massachusetts management consultancy with offices in China and 15 other countries.
This artist's rendering shows how the Metreon will change. The center will be completely remodeled to accommodate Target on the second floor. Photo: SF Redevelopment Agency / SF Redevelopment Agency
By 2020, "China will not only be a significant engine of innovation, but has the potential to create a new model for advanced drug discovery," said George Baeder, a co-author of the report who heads the group's life science practice in Shanghai.
China's "strategy of targeted government investments" - which includes $124 billion in health care spending over the next two years - is prompting many to "now see China as a compelling destination to conduct cutting-edge new research."
"At least 80,000 Western-trained life science Ph.D.s have already returned to China," says the report.
Two-thirds of Chinese life science professionals living in the United States "contemplate either returning to China for good or becoming 'sea turtles' " - those who go back and forth between the two countries in search of the best opportunities - according to a Monitor survey.
"China's life sciences industry is today gathering a critical mass of highly skilled talent, savvy and focused venture investors and growing government support as its market for drugs and medical devices escalates," says the report. (links.sfgate.com/ZKPZ)
Change for change's sake: Say goodbye to the San Francisco Convention & Visitors Bureau, which has lured tourists and business conferences to the city by the bay for lo, these past 100 years.
Say hello to the San Francisco Travel Association, or as it wishes to be known more familiarly, San Francisco Travel.
Apparently, "bureau" sounded too "bureaucratic," the agency's president and CEO, Joe D'Alessandro, told members.
The new handle speaks to "the organization's future relevance in a changing world, while also communicating our curatorial perspective and unique point of view," according to the organization's chief marketing officer, Matt Stiker.
The change becomes official on Jan. 11, along with a redesigned website and a new logo. Courtney Buechert, president of San Francisco ad agency Eleven, which designed the logo, says it "allows us to illustrate San Francisco's diversity and strengths and to dramatically deliver the impact of an icon like the Golden Gate Bridge."
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