The Greenville Zoo is about to get some nice improvements. According to the story running in the Post and Courier the Zoo will see the following:
“A giraffe feeding platform. An upgraded, more accessible Africa plaza. A new orangutan enclosure and an renovated siamang exhibit. An expanded farmyard section.
Those capital projects are in the pipeline at the Greenville Zoo, upgrades intended to enhance the experience of visitors and keep the facility in line with Association of Zoos and Aquariums accreditation standards.
Altogether, the improvements are expected to cost more than $5 million, part of which will be covered by a $1 million earmark in the state budget for the current fiscal year and the rest of which will be funded through private donations.”
I was kind of a amazed that Greenville has a Zoo given the size of the Upstate but this is just another sign of the continual improvements being made here and the quality of life is tough to beat!
Check out the Greenville Zoo’s Facebook Page for more information and some fun photos!
Dustin Tenney, a local commercial real estate agent with SVN Blackstream, posted on the Simpsonville, SC Facebook Group basically asking the 25,000 members what would they like to see developed at the 3 sites in the pictures he posted. (Update: here’s a link to one of their Simpsonville Retail Listings ).
In less than about 12 hours, there were already over 500 comments to his post. I also live in Simpsonville as does Dustin. We have seen lots of new commercial development as the city of one of the most desirable places to live in the country right now. The joke is that if something new is being developed, it’s either a dental office, a Waffle House, a car wash or an oil change station. But Dustin Tenney and his business partner, Daniel Holloway, are looking for perhaps something that the city doesn’t have yet and he solicited the public’s opinion on it. What ensued was a lot of fun and craziness and the mentioning of an incredible amount of companies and brands. I tried to go through the post and identify the companies, stores, brands, services that people wanted to see. Frankly, it was a bit mind numbing and I only made it through maybe the first 35-40% of the comments. So my analysis below is by no means scientific and I don’t vouch that it’s 100% accurate but directionally it gives you some idea what people are looking for in terms of new development in Simpsonville, SC.
Below is Dustin Tenney’s post in the Simpsonville Residents Facebook Group:
“Simpsonville! I would love for ya’ll to provide input on these three sites and “play broker/developer”. I’m serious in my interest to hear from you – I am a resident of Simpsonville as well and do a good amount of work in our city. My business partner and I know what what we don’t need any more of, as ya’ll are very vocal about that. But sometimes we don’t always think of everything we do need.
Back story, because of the cost of the dirt, we really need national tenants here, and because it’s a major thoroughfare, national tenants are what make sense anyways. The mom and pop and regional tenants are better suited with what we have going on along Main Street around Burdette.
With that said, feel free to drop me a line here, shoot me a DM or send me an email at dustin.tenney@svn.com.
SVN Blackstream Reedy River Retail
Here’s what I came up with after combing through the post comments. If a company was mentioned, I noted how many Likes / Loves it had and have attempted to add them up on a spreadsheet. As noted above, I did not get through the entire post given the number of comments. I don’t even know if this is helpful, but clearly people want a Trader Joe’s grocery store and a Texas Roadhouse. There was also lots of interesting comments about areas needed for families and kids….skate parks, ice rinks, trampoline parks, arcades, roller skating, bounce houses, mini-golf, movie theater…but the overwhelming responses where geared toward restaurants and grocery stores. There were several comments asking for coffee shops (not Starbucks) and bookstores.
Wants Likes / Loves
7Brew 4
Academy 5
Aquatic Center 5
Barnes & Noble 22
Bingo Hall 2
BJ’s 4
Buc-ees 2
California Pizza Kitchen 2
Carrabbas 3
Cheddars 1
Chicken Salad Chick 16
Chipotle 5
Clean Eatz 5
Container Store 1
Cookout 20
Copper River Grill 1
Costa Vida 2
Costco 22
Culvers 13
Dave and Busters 3
Dunkin Donuts 9
Fazoli’s 2
Fresh Market 11
Fuddruckers 7
Go-Carts 17
Half-Price Books 4
Harris Teeter 7
Home Goods 3
IKEA 4
In-n-Out Burger 14
Indoor Bounce House 8
Jason’s Deli 8
Jimmy Johns 2
Krogers 7
Lidl 6
Logans 3
Lowe’s Foods 1
Marshall’s 8
McAlister’s 9
Menard’s 4
Mini Golf 10
Mo’ Bettahs 2
Movie Theater 3
Noodles & Company 12
Old Navy 1
Once Upon a Child (thrift) 2
Pappadeux Seafood 4
PDQ 3
Pei Wei 4
PF Changs 2
Portillo’s 5
Raising Cains 8
Red Bowl 1
Red Lobster 13
Red Robin 7
Roller Rink 5
Sam’s Club 21
Shake Shack 4
Smash Burger 4
SoftSurroundings Clothing 1
Spare Time 3
Taco Cabana 2
Taziki’s 1
Texas Roadhouse 58
Top Golf 1
Trader Joe’s 92
Trampoline Park 22
Tupelo and Honey 14
Ulta Beauty 3
Uno 2
Urban Air 17
Wegman’s 31
West Elm 7
Whataburger 20
Zoe’s Kitchen 10
Below are other images of sites Dustin Tenney and Daniel Holloway are working on in Simpsonville, SC. If you’re looking for help with retail in the area, these two are doing a great job!
