O.C. Shopping Centers Vie to Exploit Tollway
Where will Orange County’s newest toll road lead to when it opens for business this morning?
That depends on which map you’re reading.
South Coast Plaza’s map shows the 15-mile, $1.5-billion San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor running smack into the shopping center’s massive parking lots on Bear Street in Costa Mesa. But Fashion Island’s version steers motorists off the road at the Bonita Canyon exit toward its own collection of tony stores in Newport Beach.
The dueling maps are part of a marketing blitz that the two Orange County shopping destinations are staging as they battle to lure consumers living at the southern end of the controversial highway.
For the record, the new roadway stretches from San Juan Capistrano to John Wayne Airport. The competing maps include directions for finding both shopping centers from the toll road.
There are 170,000 South County households with, by South Coast Plaza’s count, $1.45 billion in discretionary income. Many of those residents have avoided the two shopping centers rather than brave bumper-to-bumper traffic on the county’s existing roadways.
“That’s a huge, staggering number of potential new customers,” said Nate Franke, a retail industry accountant in Costa Mesa with Deloitte & Touche. “And it’s even more staggering when you look at the demographics of south Orange County, which are really nice if you’re an upscale retailer.”
Cal State Fullerton’s recent economic outlook suggests that the shopping centers are on target with their campaigns to lure South County shoppers. The average wage in North County is just 93.5% of the South County average, and the South County economy seems to have fared better in the recent economic expansion, the report concluded.
Both of the marketing campaigns emphasize time, a commodity in short supply in most Southern California households.
The retail centers suggest that the frustrating traffic jams that regularly turn shopping trips into hourlong nightmares will be replaced by a 15-minute joy ride on the toll road. Motorists using the highway, one of three major toll roads planned in Orange County, will pay from 50 cents to $2.
Most drivers will probably view the new roadway as a potential panacea for mind-numbing commutes to and from work. But the tollway’s financial viability also depends on the Orange County Transportation Corridor Agencies’ efforts to sell the toll road as an alternative for residents and visitors who are out for a night on the town, a day at the beach or an afternoon at the mall.
South Coast Plaza has been making a particularly strong pitch to South County residents, mailing out thousands of its own brochures and working with the transportation group on additional marketing projects.
Some transportation agency literature shows the location of South Coast Plaza--but not Fashion Island--on accompanying maps. And South Coast Plaza served as the official sponsor for a $5,000 “Shopping Spree Sweepstakes” designed to heighten awareness of the tollway--and, not coincidentally, the easy access it provides to South Coast Plaza.
The Costa Mesa shopping center is pitching the tollway as “the shortcut” to South Coast Plaza, where “world-class shopping just got closer.”
“South Coast Plaza entered into the process much more early on,” said Paul Glaab, the transportation group’s director of public affairs. “Fashion Island has been a good partner, but they haven’t been as active.”
Fashion Island, a co-sponsor along with the Orange County Business Council for the highway’s opening festivities on Wednesday night, has mailed 60,000 four-color postcards to South County residents. Along with newspaper advertisements, the postcards underscore the dramatic reduction in driving time to the center.
Fashion Island also is using its newest tenant, Bloomingdale’s, to help draw new customers.
“One of the main reasons Bloomingdale’s selected Fashion Island was because the transportation corridor ends in Newport Beach and eliminates traffic congestion,” said Michelle Bohrer, the center’s director of sales and marketing.
South County municipal officials, however, are hoping their constituents remember that shopping dollars spent locally bolster tax receipts needed to keep government programs intact.
“We hope our consumers use the tollway, but we also hope they keep their shopping dollars right here at home in South County,” said Laguna Niguel City Manager Tim Casey. “If that happens, everyone will win.”
As retail observer Franke notes, the new toll road “runs north to south as well as south to north,” which will bolster the road’s value as more retail, restaurant and entertainment ventures are added in the southern part of the county.
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This Is the Real Map
Orange County’s newest toll road opens today and two of the area’s large shopping meccas have printed their own maps to lure shoppers from the highway.
According to South Coast Plaza’s map, the new tollway seems to empty right into its parking lot in Costa Mesa. In reality, motorists need to take the Bear Street exit, which leads to the center’s parking lots.
Fashion Island’s map has a dotted line that emphasizes route from the Bonita Canyon exit to the Newport Beach mall.
The route of the toll road and its approximity to the two malls:
