JIM CHARTER : Jingle Bells at Cash Register : For Brea Mall Manager, ‘Tis the Make-or-Break Season

There is no merrier sound to a retailer’s ear than that of a constantly ringing cash register.

And with the vast bulk of the year’s sales occurring in November and December, brisk sales during the holiday season are crucial for the nation’s merchants. And Jim Charter, general manager of the Brea Mall, is no exception.

Charter, 62, joined the 12-year-old Brea Mall, at the intersection of Imperial Highway and State College Boulevard, in May, 1986--the day after he retired as May Centers’ regional manager for the Los Angeles area. Easy-going and affable, the longtime retail veteran is a native of Orange who lives these days in Newport Beach.

In a recent interview with Times Staff Writer Mary Ann Galante, Charter discussed the outlook for retailers this holiday season, and what’s hot--and what’s not--this year.

Charter also offered his view on major issues in the retail industry, talking about the importance of customer service, leveraged buyouts and the effect of mergers in the retail industry, and the ongoing, $120-million renovation of Brea Mall.

Q. For the retail industry in general, what do you see for the Christmas season?

A. At this point, I think it will be fine. We were facing an election last year, and people were uncertain and unsure. Inflation isn’t too bad. There seems to be good news from around the world. I’m thinking about the situation with the Berlin Wall.

Q. How do international events impact retail sales at Christmas?

A. I think they affect people. We’ve become an electronic age more and more. I think people realize that what they see on TV is real. If you feel good, particularly at Christmastime, you think of people to buy presents for.

Q. Would it be fair to say that at least 25% to 30% of the retail industry’s sales are during the holiday season in November and December?

A. Yes. It’s the important season for retailing in America. If America doesn’t have a good Christmas season, the economy gets in trouble. That’s why, when you ask why we put up decorations so early, you just don’t realize how important it is to the retailer to be successful.

You have to be ready. When you turn on your lights and you have Santa there, by God, they’d better be working and everything has to be ready. People have to realize that the retailer is going to do what’s accepted. As long as people accept (early seasonal merchandising) and are happy about it, that’s fine, and we have room for Halloween.

Q. Why does the Christmas sales season seem to start earlier and earlier every year? Why are we seeing signs of the holidays before Thanksgiving?

A. Has there been any advertising in the Los Angeles Times for Christmas? Tell the staff at The Times that when they put a deadline in Christmas advertising, we’ll put a deadline in Christmas decorations. It’s amusing that the people who ask me the questions are the ones that sell the Christmas advertising in September.

You can’t expect to come into a season like Christmas without preparing. We’re not Tinkerbell, where we can wave our magic wand and it appears. We’re not Walt Disney, and it’s not a cartoon. It’s the real world. And we have to prepare for this. So we start in June.

Q. But why are the retailers putting out Christmas displays, in some cases, even before Halloween?

A. Before Halloween is a little early. But after that, you need to get ready. When are they going to sell? You’re in the Christmas season (by) the first of November. You need to change your displays. It’s not the night before Christmas.

Q. Are there any “must” items that consumers are snapping up this season?

A. I think you’re going to find that people will buy nice items, (such as) wearing apparel or gifts for the home. I don’t know of any gimmicks that are here. I suppose CD players are going to be hot. Electronic items or personal PCs or programs are coming up. Nintendo, of course, for the children.

Q. Are we going to see a lot of last-minute discounting this holiday season again?

A. I think there’s a certain amount of discounting right now. But I think you have to be careful what’s discounted and what isn’t. I believe there will be a certain amount of discounting. Retailers do it every year. I’m not sure that it’s going to dominate the season.

They always wait till the very end. It’s sort of a little contest between the public and the retailers. If the merchant has bought right and has the products that people want, he doesn’t need a discount because he’s already sold it. I don’t think there’s going to be a lot of panic buying. I think you need to go out and be sensible in your shopping.

Q. Will Orange County do as well as the rest of the country in sales this holiday season?

A. I think Orange County is a Shangri-La. I think we’ll do as well or better. I think there’s a little shakedown in certain areas--certainly the savings and loan industry. But I think Orange County is strong. I think Los Angeles County is too.

The only problem, with the unemployment rate so low, is that nobody can afford to live in the areas where you need employment. It’s amazing what you have to make today to exist in this county. So everybody lives outside the county and workers need to be brought in.

The problem is you’ve got hungry, homeless people living in an idyllic climate, and you’re going to have to find space for them. Those are also the people that are needed to work in the restaurants, the homes and in shopping centers. They need to have the ability to make a living. The issue is something that Orange County’s going to have to face.

Q. Will Brea Mall be affected this Christmas by the fact that you still have ongoing construction?

A. No. I don’t believe so. We’ve had some good traffic. We’re up around 5% for the year to date through October.

Q. Concerning the retail industry in general, do you see a thinning of department store and major store dominance in favor of specialty retailers? Or perhaps in favor of the highly focused stores geared toward specific groups?

A. I don’t really think it has to do with specialty stores. If you have a department store and you do it right, you can get your merchandise group. The problem is management and how they’re approaching it. It’s important to know who your merchandise group is. It’s having a retailer that knows the business and who can communicate with his people on the floor. A specialty chain can do well if it can give service and if it is able to turn around on a dime.

Q. You’re talking about quick turn-around in merchandise?

A. Yes. Being able to bring up resources and find out what the public wants. Finding out what your market is and knowing your market. Knowing the age group, the income group and realizing that they’re in your area.

Q. In general, are the specialty chains doing a good job?

A. The majority of ours at Brea Mall do, I think. Contempo continues to do well. The Limited, Silverwoods and Units are finding a market in our center.

Q. Do you see a greater acceptance of off-price stores, of the discounters?

A. No. I see an acceptance of stores that give value to the people. At one time, I heard a seminar speaker say that if people come into your store and you do something that’s unacceptable to them, between nine to 20 people are going to hear about it. But if you go in and you have good service, you may not tell anybody.

It’s a concept that people have of you and your store. Number one, they want to feel like they have a bargain. Number two, everybody has an ego. When you give service to somebody, you’re tapping your ego. You’re pampering it. That’s important.

Q. There has been a wave of leveraged buyouts in the retail industry. Are we going to see higher-leveraged companies? Are we going to see more big stores on the auction block?

A. I think what you’re seeing now is that the big get better and the weak get weaker. I think that (Robert) Campeau (who bought Federated Department Stores in 1988 for $6.6 billion

did a disservice to the retail business and all of North America. He came in and he overextended himself. There was no thought of tomorrow, just today.

Q. Does that have an effect on the retail industry?

A. To a certain amount, yes. I think people wonder what’s going on. Right now there are stories in the papers about discounts for Christmas because (of) Campeau and the ability of Campeau to pay (for merchandise). I think it makes a shopper wary of what’s going on.

Q. What do you see for Bullock’s since its acquisition by Macy’s last year?

A. I think it’s inevitable that Bullock’s (takes the) Macy’s (name). And I don’t know whether the merchandising will stay the same.

Q. Would mergers in the retail industry cause downward pressure on rents in the malls, assuming, for example, that there would be less competition for the space?

A. That depends. The majority of major department stores own their own space. The only thing that affects our rent is if you have a retailer in a mall with weak department stores, or department stores that are about ready to leave the mall. Then you have to rent with going rates.

Q. Going back to the effect on consumers, don’t mergers in the industry also benefit consumers, in the sense that there would be discounting of merchandise?

A. To an extent. It also affects supply. The bottom line is fashion. If you get the fashion that people want, that’s what’s going to sell. You don’t go to buy a dress and say, ‘Gee, this company’s going broke. I don’t want this one, I’ll buy this one instead.’ When you go into a store, you want the latest fashion. And if department store X has it on sale for $99 and the store down the street has it for $69, you’re going to buy it for $69.

People are success-driven. When you go into a store that’s not successful, you get a lot of droopy sales people who are inattentive. And you really get turned off. When you go to a successful store and see somebody who’s happy to see you, who presents you with merchandise that you know is right, you buy it.

Q. In Orange County, do you see an increase in service among malls here? Are they trying to outdo each other in services?

A. I don’t perceive it as outdoing anybody. I perceive it as trying to accommodate our customers.

Q. The regional malls locally have basically the same selection of anchors and very similar selections of retailers, with a very few exceptions. What can you do to maintain individuality? How do you attract people when there is such similarity in the retailers?

A. We know our market. We use marketing programs and advertising so that customers don’t travel by us to go to South Coast Plaza or MainPlace/Santa Ana.

Q. From how far away does Brea Mall draw customers?

A. They travel from as far as Pomona, Chino Hills, Diamond Bar, then into Corona, Yorba Linda, Anaheim Hills, Anaheim, Whittier Heights, La Habra Heights and some parts of Orange. I think once we get (more) stores going (next year), we’ll get some people back from the Santa Ana area, because some of those customers were frequenting us before. But we’re going to concentrate mostly in this area and to the north.

Q. Do you think we’re over-malled already in Orange County?

A. I think for the population, we’re over-retailed. There’s so much retail it’s unbelievable. And I think there’s going to be a time when you see the strong get stronger and the weak get weaker. At some point and time, there has to be a stop. But as long as there’s growth, we continue to expand.

Q. Brea Mall has been undergoing a renovation for two years now. How has the mall changed since you arrived?

A. The new Nordstrom store opened in February. We started in August of 1987 and we’ve remodeled the entire mall. We have new retailers. We have new activities, we have a completely new food court.

We’ve consistently been in a growth pattern, and we probably will be for the next two to three years. We’ll be opening new stores through all of 1990. Robinson’s will start construction early next year and it will take them about 14 months.

Q. Some of your competitors have also undergone renovations recently. Fashion Island at Newport Center, for one, just finished a massive remodeling. Why do you think that Fashion Island in the past hasn’t done as well as it might have?

A. They put it in the wrong place. It’s very difficult to get people in there. They should have put it next to the freeway. Freeways have meant a lot to the development shopping center. Brea Mall is indebted forever to the 57 Freeway.

La Habra Fashion Square, on the other hand, is going down in flames because the (proposed) 39 Freeway was shot down. If that freeway had gone through you would have had a very competitive shopping center. Freeways have made a big difference.

Q. Do you think Orange County consumers will ever see a major regional mall at the Golden Triangle (the area in South County where the San Diego and Santa Ana freeways merge)?

A. There might once have been the time to build a regional mall there. But I think it is past its time. I think they could do some different types of retailing there and some offices. But to have a regional center, to me, is like putting in a Crystal Court where they put it. (Crystal Court is a retail annex of South Coast Plaza.)

There is the Laguna Hills Mall and the Mission Viejo Mall and they’re still viable. If there would be some expansion in those malls, then we wouldn’t need a regional mall at the Golden Triangle. If you could attract a Nordstrom at Mission Viejo or Laguna Hills, that would kill the potential of (a regional mall at) the Golden Triangle.

Q. On a personal level, what do you like about retailing?

A. I’m dealing with both the tenants and the public and it’s a challenge. It’s fun seeing things happen like this building, getting the mall built up, getting things accomplished.

Q. What’s the worst part of your job?

A. I guess keeping the payables paid and the receivables received. You work long hours. You work hard. It isn’t something you take off when you go home.

But retailing is in the center of everything. It’s what makes the world go round. They say love does, but I think it’s retailing. Selling makes things happen. People make money, and that’s what keeps the world going. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with making a profit. If you don’t have profit, you don’t open up the next day.

Retailers have to change and they have to be there to service the customer. And servicing the customer is more than a smile on their faces and saying, ‘Have a good day.’ It’s being able to give them the product they want, and knowing what they need or what they want.

If you can do that, then you can survive. What they want today is not what they’re going to want tomorrow and you’d better be aware of that.