NEW YORK — Well-heeled shoppers of Texas have a new and improved place to spend their money: the expanded Prime Outlets at San Marcos.
“It is a rite of passage for every Texan to shop there once in their life,” said Bob Brvenik, president of Prime Retail Group, the center’s owner and operator. “It’s a shopper’s paradise.”
New retailers are adding to this 550,000-square-foot Eden, whose unlikely home is at the edge of the Texas foothills. Ferragamo USA. Inc., for example, opened its first outlet store in Texas at the San Marcos center last week, to one of the largest opening-weekend sales.
“The Prime Outlets location has become a major destination for international and local shoppers alike,” said Lynda Abdoo, senior vice president of retail for Ferragamo.
It’s about to become even bigger. After the Alamo, the center is already one of the top tourist destinations in the state and is ranked in the top-five performing outlet centers in the country by the International Council of Shopping Centers. And thanks to a $20 million investment in San Marcos, Prime recently captured BCBG Max Azria Group’s first BCBGirls and To The Max store in the U.S., which is piggybacking an existing 4,000-square-foot BCBG outlet in San Marcos.
To The Max will grow into its own space with the center’s 200,000-square-foot expansion, which should be completed in late 2005 and will feature Neiman Marcus as its anchor tenant. Calvin Klein Inc. and Hugo Boss AG will also be opening stores in late 2005.
“We stress the notion of trading up in terms of the luxury component of our tenants,” said Brvenik. “San Marcos is the first project where you can really see the fruits of our labor.”