Business owners happy with Town Center

  • Eric Fetters<br>For the Enterprise
  • Monday, March 3, 2008 6:48am

Janet Berwick took a sharp detour from her previous career as a health care administrator to sell gourmet kibble, canine raincoats and other products aimed at furry, four-legged customers.

When she was looking for the perfect location for her fledgling business, she found it in Mill Creek Town Center. It’s a decision she’s confident in a month after opening the doors to her shop, Paddywack.

“I have been very encouraged. The people here have been so supportive of all the businesses in the Town Center,” Berwick said.

A year after the first few pioneers opened their doors in Mill Creek’s new downtown shopping area, Town Center hosts two dozen stores, restaurants and business offices. Plans for more buildings and businesses are moving ahead.

“The city is really thrilled with the success of the Town Center so far,” said Bill Trimm, the city’s community development director. “When you drive down there now, you see people walking up and down Main Street and sitting in front of the restaurants and creating community, which we didn’t have so much before.”

Among the latest announced tenants are Pier 1 Imports and Boston Pizza, which will be located in the third phase of the development on the west side of Main Street.

Developed by Wakefield Pacific, the third-phase plans call for seven buildings with 121,000 square feet of retail, office and residential space.

That includes a five-story building with ground-floor commercial space and four floors containing 36 condominium units, Trimm said.

A three-story parking garage is planned next door. The final building plans are awaiting city approval, but site preparation work has begun.

At the other end of the new Main Street section, the 46,000-square-foot L.A. Fitness gym, the first in Washington state, is nearing completion. The company said it has sold 1,700 memberships in advance of its June opening.

G.E. “Red” Jacobsen, the developer who built the Park Place Center building in Mill Creek Town Center, said he is looking forward to the fitness club’s opening. It will draw people in for workouts who will be likely to stay and have a meal or shop, he said.

Jacobsen is getting closer to breaking ground on Creekside Village, a five-building development with commercial space and a central entertainment area that will host concerts, movies and other events. Underground parking also will be built.

So far, 85 to 90 percent of the project’s space has been reserved by tenants, Jacobsen said.

Just to the north of that development, another developer is planning an 18,000-square-foot building.

In the meantime, the recent arrivals to Town Center’s storefronts seem generally happy with the number of shoppers drawn to the area.

“We’re doing great. We’re doing better than we were in Woodinville,” said Steve Alexander, co-owner of The Atrium, which moved from Woodinville’s central shopping district about two months ago. With a variety of silk flowers and other home decor products, The Atrium has one of the Town Center’s most visible storefronts at the northeast corner of Main and 153rd Street SE, across the street from University Book Store.

A block to the south, InSpa, Kabloom, Supercuts and Cold Stone Creamery have opened along with Paddywack. At least two more businesses are scheduled to open in the coming weeks.

To date, only one of the small businesses that opened in the Town Center, Tuscadeli Cafe, has closed. That eatery was one of the first to move in, even before all of Main Street was open to pedestrians and traffic.

Jenifer Franklin, owner of the Kabloom flower store, said she expects traffic into her store to only improve as the third-phase buildings go up across the street and other merchants move in.

Jacobsen said he’s not surprised by the enthusiasm, on behalf of both the community and business owners, for the Town Center.

“This will be a great success,” he said. “It really will be.”

Eric Fetters is a reporter with The Herald in Everett.

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