An Introduction to Retale: Retail Retold by Bobby Boone.

A forewarning… I’m a total retail nerd.

However, I hope you enjoy this blog, as I share my understanding of retail real estate decisions and how they impact the customers and communities they serve. These topics include national trends, best practices, and other random thoughts about how and why we shop.

To kick us off, let me introduce myself and a little about my journey.

Growing up fascinated by the built environment, I often found myself buried in floor plan books at Home Depot during routine trips with my parents, yet I didn’t realize I was blindly in love with retail until years later.

I initially followed my dream of designing homes, so that one day I could play a part in solving the world’s housing crisis and maybe as a bonus, get a floor plan or two in one of the books at Home Depot. I quickly realized, that housing policy was vexing and that my true interest in the built environment was in creating spaces and places that all can enjoy. For me, this intersection of life was most true in retail spaces, where everyone fulfills their most basic needs such as groceries and clothing and often their impulsive desires including your favorite cocktail and 10th pair of leather boots.

In undergrad, I charted a new territory, being responsible for obtaining all goods and services needed to sustain my frugal, yet social lifestyle. It wasn’t too big of an adaption, but I did quickly notice that the under-resourced neighborhood in the southside of Tallahassee was much different than the middle class suburban neighborhood I once called home. This observation was the first step in establishing my life’s purpose, of expanding retail access to communities like the Tallahassee’s southside.

My first project: Served as the co-lead for a $750,000, Knight Foundation funded streetscape improvement to connect campus to the commercial corridor. Cute, right?!

More at https://kccitallahassee.com/project/southside-sense-of-place/.

During my graduate coursework, I had an opportunity to study abroad in Istanbul, where I not only completed a Retail Location Theory course but also observed how people interacted with retail. It was truly a social environment. Specialty vendors roamed neighborhoods to bring the product to the people - a low-tech amazon! Friends and strangers gathered at cafes and restaurants, never rushed by the wait staff to wrap their engaging conversations. Markets and brands lined the corridors along primary routes of travel to capture both routine and incidental sales.

My world was shifted. I wanted to recreate this experience for as many as possible.

I joined Urban Fast Forward, a commercial real estate start up, as an intern upon returning to Cincinnati, to work on commercial form based code projects with the city’s new zoning rewrite. I realized consulting was it!

My consulting journey continued during my five year stint at Streetsense. After completing nearly 100 projects from clients ranging from fortune 500 brands seeking to reposition their real estate assets to co-creating retail environments with developers. My final project at Streetsense was one of the most challenging, yet a common challenge - helping Detroit’s neighborhood right-size their commercial districts. This project led me to accepting a role to further implement the project’s strategies and recruiting tenants to create vibrant commercial corridors.

And now I’m here, ready to work with more communities, developers, and retailers/restaurants in catalyzing sales by serving their communities!

Let’s work!