Podcast [Interview] Ed Skira of UrbanToronto Discusses the City's Incredible Development Boom
Craig and Ed Skira discuss how Toronto’s rapid growth is impacting retail as thousands of new residential units are added to the city yearly. Skira makes predictions based on increased immigration numbers. UrbanToronto also launched UrbanToronto Pro, a database showcasing what’s happening.
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Interviewed this episode:
Edward Skira, Owner of Chart Communications Inc./UrbanToronto.ca.
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Background Music Credit: Hard Boiled Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Overall leasing activity in the Calgary retail market has reached its pre-pandemic level.
A report by commercial real estate firm JLL said the strong leasing activity that started in 2021 has continued into 2022 and local retailers remain optimistic about increased future sales fuelled by pent-up demand.
“Asking rents are trending upwards. Q1 2022 rents have seen a 15 per cent increase from Q1 2020. Effective rents are rising as well, but they remain down from pre-pandemic levels. Notably, several fast-food operators are bidding on similar spaces driving rates up,” said the report.
“There has been a strong net positive absorption this year in tandem with a surge in deliveries. While new construction is adding retail inventory to the market, a lot of these spaces have already been absorbed through pre- leasing. Percentage of available space remains flat even with the positive net absorption. General retail has contributed most to this positive absorption.
“Tenants are searching through existing inventory and future development opportunities to expand their businesses, particularly in the suburbs. With a tighter market, rental rates are expected to continue their upward trajectory in the short term.”
Image: Ron Odagaki
Ron Odagaki, Senior Sales Associate, Retail with JLL, described the market in Calgary as having sustained demand.
“2021 was the turning point. There’s still a positive trend from the beginning of 2022. There’s still pent-up demand I believe from retailers and from consumers,” he said.
“I think that continues from a leasing perspective. You’re still seeing an upward pressure on rental rates and a downward pressure on vacancy.”
Total inventory of retail space in the Calgary market is 74.9 million square feet with 1.6 million square feet under construction. Total availability is about 4.2 per cent, which is up from 3.1 per cent in 2019 after peaking at 4.6 per cent in 2020.
The JLL report said the market is seeing retailer leasing demand that is higher in the suburbs but lower downtown as foot traffic in the downtown core hasn’t yet returned to pre-pandemic norms. With employees starting to return to office environments, we should see more sustained traffic patterns in the downtown core and consequently higher demand, it said.
“We’re not out of the woods yet. We’re not at the 2019 traffic yet. Have we reached an equilibrium on what the downtown looks like today as for hybrid working models, full-time back to the office?,” said Odagaki. “And then the question about the current vacancy. The vacancy is improving but where does that equilibrium get to? I don’t think we’re there yet.
1800 4 St SW, Calgary, AB (Image: Strategic Group Leasing)
“There is this optimism but there’s still this wait and see from a number of retailers.”
Of the major retail corridors, the fastest recovery is along 17th Avenue and on 4th Street. Traffic is returning to these nodes, and the retail vacancy rate has plateaued but isn’t yet starting to decline, said the JLL report, adding that Calgary has regained foot traffic better than many other cities including Ottawa, Montreal, and Toronto.
Vacancy rates have continued to be high in areas in the downtown core. Beltline, Central Core South, Central Court North, and East Village have vacancy rates of 5.8 per cent, 6.1 per cent, 6.7 per cent, and 11.5 per cent, respectively. Outside the downtown core, vacancy has been under four per cent, it said.
“With its anticipated population growth, Calgary stands as a significant market for retail expansion. Relaxation of physical store restrictions, higher personal savings levels, and increased consumer confidence have pushed demand for spending,” said JLL. “We’ve seen a spending shift from categories such as home furnishing and home improvement to travel and entertainment. As festivals, conferences, and cultural events resume, tourism spending should also return and contribute to Calgary’s retail sales.”
Odagaki said the vacancy rate, particularly in the downtown, did not reach the level many people might have expected considering the challenging economic times and public health restrictions of the past two years.
77 Edmonton Trail, Calgary, AB (Image: CDNGLOBAL Alberta)
He said a combination of landlords assisting retailers as well as government support was helpful in keeping the retail vacancy rate at a lower level.
“Through the times that retailers had to be closed, a number of categories found other alternatives to get their products to market be it online, curbside, when they were allowed to open,” added Odagaki. “A lot of different ways so retailers were not completely shut down and still able to provide goods or services.
“That has played a factor in why the vacancy hasn’t really fluctuated as much as maybe some had expected. And as we come back to recovery, the retailers are now finding it as getting back to normal in terms of selling practices again.”
Retail Insider is streamlining its Canadian retail news from around the web to include a handful of top news stories that can be viewed quickly during the day. Here are the top stories from the past several days.
Minakakis talks about what retailers should be doing to survive and thrive, labour shortages in the industry, closures of businesses, whether consumers are back spending, and how retailers need to be street smart, tech driven, customer obsessed and bold innovators.
The Video Interview Series by Retail Insider is available on YouTube.
Connect with Mario Toneguzzi, a veteran of the media industry for more than 40 years and named in 2021 a Top Ten Business Journalist in the world and the only Canadian – to learn how you can tell your story, share your message and amplify it to a wide audience. He is Senior National Business Journalist with Retail Insider and owner of Mario Toneguzzi Communications Inc. and can be reached at mdtoneguzzi@gmail.com.
Also check out the other series offered by Retail Insider, including The Weekly podcast and The Interview Series, which are both available on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Google Podcasts, or through our dedicated RSS feed for Simplecast and other podcast players.
Celebrity Chef Vikram Vij is partnering with Eat Up Canada to launch a new chef-inspired Indian street food restaurant concept called ‘Bombay Frankies‘ in the Greater Toronto Area in September.
Newmarket will be Bombay Frankies’ first location in Canada with franchising opportunities to grow the brand.
Vikram Vij
Restaurant industry veterans and co-founders of Eat Up Canada, Alex Gerzon and George Heos, already have plans for Bombay Frankies’ growth and expansion across Canada.
“The goal is to open three to five locations in the first year, with the potential for more than 100 restaurants in 10 years,” said Heos. “Having seen the rise in popularity of Indian cuisine in Canada, we believe there’s a huge opportunity for Bombay Frankies in the fast casual restaurant sector.
Rendering: Bombay Frankies
“We really wanted to start with a great site. It wasn’t so much which specific market it would be. Our strategy is going to be to locate our restaurants in very high quality shopping centres and this is one of those types of shopping centres. We’re building a brand that is going to have mass appeal.
George Heos
“Sometimes I think people think that it’s a so-called ethnic brand and shouldn’t you be going into a market that is predominantly that ethnic group. Our strategy is really to build a brand that is going to be enjoyed by Canadians as a whole rather than targeting all these specific demographic groups.”
The restaurant is named after India’s all-time number one street food, the frankie roll, which originated in the city of Bombay. The frankie is a handheld, burrito-style flatbread wrap called a paratha, filled with meat or vegetables and Indian spices and sauces. Bombay Frankies will serve a variety of meat and vegetarian frankie options, plus frankie bowls, salads, side items and drinks.
Rendering: Bombay Frankies
Celebrity Chef, restaurateur, cookbook author and TV personality Vij will oversee menu development as the team prepares for the grand opening of the first Bombay Frankies in Newmarket, at Yonge Street and Green Lane at the Green Lane Centre, in early September.
“Those AAA type newer centres is what our strategy will be,” said Heos.
Franchising opportunities are available, and Eat Up Canada is looking for great locations for Bombay Frankies across the GTA and Ontario, ideally between 1,200 and 1,500 square feet.
“My partner Alex Gerzon and I have collectively been in the restaurant industry over 50 years,” said Heos. “We realize that at the end of the day a restaurant concept is successful because of the food. Marketing and branding and all that is great but people choose based on their stomach. Does it taste good and do they feel good about eating it?
Rendering: Bombay Frankies
“We fell in love with this product when we first tried it about three years ago. We didn’t know anything about it, what a frankie was. And we tried it and we found it was very, very craveable. And as we started to do more research we realized this was India’s number one street food, available widely there. And we just thought this was a product that we really could build a brand around. It was something that we believed Canadians will love.
“It’s an affordable handheld product that can be made quickly, enjoyed whether it’s on the go or it’s going to be a great delivery, pick-up product which is obviously very important these days. At the end of the day, it’s an opportunity to expose the wonderful tastes and flavours of India in a format that a lot of Canadians would be comfortable with, which is a handheld burrito-like product.”
Alexander Gerzon
Heos said he and Gerzon feel so fortunate to work with Vij, someone who is so accomplished in the Indian space and is so passionate about this project. He was born in India and is from Bombay. It’s one of the reasons Eat Up Canada is so confident in the brand. People rave about his food and Vij is not just a chef but a restaurateur as well. He believes in hospitality and guest service.
“Frankies have always been dear to my heart because they bring me back to the streets of India, its culture and deep-rooted food history. Namaste and enjoy,” says Vij.
Eat Up Canada, which was formed in 2021, is the Canadian master franchisee for Pokeworks and is focused on developing restaurant brands new to Canada. Prior to launching Eat Up Canada, Heos and Gerzon were the co-founders of Onfire Restaurants Inc. and have held senior roles in franchising, real estate, construction, finance, marketing, and operations at some of Canada’s largest restaurant companies.
Winnipeg-based FGC Health continues to grow its footprint in the pharmacy space with the acquisition of five Calgary drug stores.
FGC, which owns, operates, and services independent pharmacies, medical clinics, home health care and ambulatory care services, now has 10 pharmacies in its portfolio – three in Ontario and seven in Alberta – which are being branded as Healthful Pharmacy, which will be launched in the third quarter of this year.
Dalbir Bains
“Our ongoing success has provided us the chance to continue growing and expanding our network of retail pharmacy locations, and with that opportunity we plan to bring our innovative and modernized approach to managing retail pharmacies and their customer experiences to Canadians all across this country,” said Dalbir Bains, CEO of FGC Health.
The company has also announced the hiring of industry veteran Trevor Paynter as Executive Vice President of Pharmacy Operations. Paynter joins FGC Health after 20 years working in the retail pharmacy industry, most recently serving as the Director of Pharmacy and Retail Operations for Walgreens.
Trevor Paynter
“With Trevor Paynter joining our team at the helm of this ongoing expansion and transformation, we are primed to bring positive change and innovative strategies to the industry as a whole, and these recent acquisitions play a significant role in making that a reality,” added Bains.
The company’s newest acquisitions in Calgary include Hope Medicare, Whitehorn Pharmacy, and three Martindale Pharmacy locations.
FGC Health began in January 2020. The company’s initials stand for Freedom, Growth, Community.
“The plan is to reach about 50 pharmacies by the end of the year,” said Bains.
“With seven pharmacies in Alberta, one of the things we really gain is tremendous knowledge and experience in how to provide personalized services that pharmacists can do under an expanded scope . . . For us, Alberta is the most progressive province. So we wanted to certainly have a strong presence there because that’s where we think the future of pharmacy is going, more in terms of service as opposed to just product. But in Ontario they also announced a progressive program Minor Ailments where pharmacists will be able to prescribe medications under certain protocols.
Image: FGC Health
“That gives us the opportunity to apply the same knowledge in the Ontario market. Obviously Trevor is leading that effort.”
One of the initiative’s key components is the pharmacy partner program where pharmacists will have an equity position in the business.
“A lot of the young pharmacists are finding it hard to get in because the prices have gone up and a lot of the female pharmacists because of mat leave and other issues are also finding it hard to own. So we’re looking at different models to bring in people,” said Bains.
“We just brought in our first female pharmacy partner recently and what it does is it puts the power back in the hands of the people that deliver the care. With the right information, the right data, the right interventions given to them. That’s the key. It has to be together.”
Bains said the company is focused on community – how can the pharmacy go from being a pill dispenser to a community resource. It’s the mindset it takes as it believes community is what drives big change. The strategy is to be able to provide multiple services through the pharmacies.
“As I looked for the next step in my career within the healthcare and retail pharmacy field, FGC Health and its mission of transforming the customer experience at pharmacies across Canada stood out to me, and I could not be more excited to join the team and to serve a key role in this mission moving forward,” said Paynter. “Stepping into this role has provided me the opportunity I have always looked for to change the industry and empower the owners and operators of retail pharmacies while putting the customer experience at the forefront of the field.
Image: FGC Health (Bradford Store Signage)
“It’s about having the pharmacists being able to practice at the top end of their license. We talk about the community, it’s really important to think about how the pharmacist is truly the most accessible health care provider in the community . . . We’re looking to have a full complement of the health services that we’re taking to the market.”
Bains said independent pharmacy is suffering right now and comparison sales have been declining for the vast majority of independents. Some of that is because many independents were not ready for the COVID-19 pandemic. That customer wave was lost.
“For us now, it’s really not about us putting in money to own our own pharmacies but we’re doing it largely because we think there’s a better way and that better way is to hold on to the one advantage that all these independents have which is the personalization of service,” said Bains. “There’s a personalization of care that is very difficult to replicate by chains.
“We believe that with that personalized care model with the right environment around those businesses, they will win and they will win by one measure, which is patient outcomes. Patients will do better under their care than somewhere else. And so we’re trying to basically get to the market with tools and programs to basically lift up the independent to say no we’ll compete now and kick the chain’s ass.
“This is about a renaissance involving independents. We’re certainly one of many who are supporting this evolution but we’re very excited about being I would say the underdog in this whole fight.”
Future Sunglass Hut on the Upper Level at CF Pacific Centre in downtown Vancouver (May 2022). Photo: Lee Rivett.
International retailer Sunglass Hut, owned by Italian-based Luxottica Group, will be relocating within CF Pacific Centre in downtown Vancouver.
The retailer is currently in a 463 square foot location on the lower level between Vancouver-based Blue Ruby jewelers and Canadian retailer Club Monaco.
Sunglass Hut Relocation Map at CF Pacific Centre. Map: Cadillac Fairview with notations by Retail Insider.
Current Sunglass Hut on the Lower Level at CF Pacific Centre in downtown Vancouver (May 2022). Photo: Lee Rivett.
Sunglass Hut was founded in 1971 by optometrist Sanford L. Ziff in Miami, Florida and continued to grow until 1986 when investment firm Kidd, Kamm & Co. purchased a 75% stake in the company and the remaining stake in 1991.
In the mid-90s, the company went onto the New York stock exchange and expanded into selling watches under the retail banners of Watch Station, Watch World, and as combined Sunglass Hut-Watch Station stores.
In February 2001, the Luxottica Group acquired Sunglass Hut and associated watch retail chains.
Sunglass Hut Locations in the Greater Vancouver Area. Photo: Sunglass Hut Store Locator Map
Sunglass Hut has boutiques in Hudson’s Bay and Cabela’s retail locations and operates ten standalone retail locations in the greater Vancouver area at:
There are currently 12 Specsavers locations operating in the province of British Columbia:
Chilliwack (Cottonwood)
Coquitlam (Coquitlam Centre)
Delta (Scottsdale)
Vancouver (Dunbar)
Vancouver (Kingsway)
Vancouver (Kitsilano)
Langley (Willowbrook Mall)
Surrey (Guildford Town Centre)
Kelowna (Orchard Park)
Burnaby (Lougheed Mall)
Nanaimo (Woodgrove)
Abbotsford (Sevenoaks)
Specsavers was founded nearly 40 years ago in the U.K. by optometrist husband and wife team, Doug and Mary Perkins, who set out to provide best-value, quality eyecare to everybody. There are now more than 2,300 Specsavers locations serving 41 million patients and customers in the U.K., the Republic of Ireland, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Spain, Australia, and New Zealand – and now Canada.
Pinnacle One Yonge Commercial (Image via Hariri Pontarini Architects)
UrbanToronto has launched a new database of developments in the Greater Toronto Area.
If you’re looking to track real estate development in the GTA, this new database service is for anyone interested in development, planning and scouting for new locations.
Edward Skira, President/Co-Publisher of UrbanToronto.ca, said the website tracks development of all sorts in the GTA.
Edward Skira
“It basically tracks everything from Burlington to Oshawa to Newmarket and everything within Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton and so forth,” he said. “We have our discussion forum. That’s how we started in 2002 and over time we built up a database of all the projects that are happening, all the companies that are attached to the projects and we are also a media site, so we do something like five to seven stories a day. They’re all focused on development one way or the other.
“We do about two million page views a month on UrbanToronto. We do about 300,000 unique visitors a month. We have very strong social numbers. And we have a newsletter with about 6,000 subscribers.”
“(The database) is a brand new addition to our offering,” said Skira. “We are a media company. So we do help with marketing and such. But in the last year or so we’ve become much more of a data driven organization. We have company listings and there’s about 200 subscribers to that. We have a newsletter that’s an industry-focused newsletter and it attracts development and that goes out every morning at 7 a.m. And we have about 130 subscribers to that and that’s a paid newsletter.
CIBC Square (Image: Ivanhoé Cambridge)
“UrbanToronto takes our database of projects and companies and allows subscribers to access it and take all the information on every project and every company and play with the day. So you can slice and dice the data in a million ways. You can track development in a very specific neighbourhood or across the entire GTA and that’s the brand new addition to the company.
“We’re tracking everything from a small townhouse development all the way to CIBC Square which is a massive office complex being constructed downtown right now. Everything within. We track residential, we track hotels, we track industrial, we track retail, we track offices. Every asset class.”
Skira said the database is geared for companies in the business who want to track what’s happening. It could be a developer who has a piece of land that they want to figure out what to do with. The platform has a map where you can draw a radius of a kilometre or four kilometres around that location and pull all the information about everything that is happening in that area.
Mirvish Village (Rendering: Henriquez Partners Architects, Diamond Schmitt Architects)
Developers, architects, realtors, a bank, a grocery chain, retailers have all shown interest in the database.
Companies can create a report for a certain neighbourhood or address that would identify how many residential homes are being proposed for the area and the potential population growth in a specific area based on what development projects are there.
“It’s an important tool for anybody that wants to see where development is going. Retail, transit, school boards. You can do very specific stuff but you can also look overall. You can break it up by cities. You can do a report that’s just Toronto or you can do a report that’s just Toronto Ward 7. We have the tools to be able to slice and dice the data in all sorts of ways,” said Skira.
Skira said the database tracks all the city applications on a daily basis. There’s an update page where people can see all the new projects sorted by date.
“So those 2,500 projects in our database can be looked at in all sorts of different ways.”
Druker talks about the spike in new franchises this year, the number of net new jobs, how growth is in every province with Alberta leading the way, how the sector contributes to the Canadian economy and who is attracted to owning a franchise.
The Video Interview Series by Retail Insider is available on YouTube.
Connect with Mario Toneguzzi, a veteran of the media industry for more than 40 years and named in 2021 a Top Ten Business Journalist in the world and the only Canadian – to learn how you can tell your story, share your message and amplify it to a wide audience. He is Senior National Business Journalist with Retail Insider and owner of Mario Toneguzzi Communications Inc. and can be reached at mdtoneguzzi@gmail.com.
Also check out the other series offered by Retail Insider, including The Weekly podcast and The Interview Series, which are both available on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Google Podcasts, or through our dedicated RSS feed for Simplecast and other podcast players.
