Eli Gindi Snags Tenants for Las Vegas Shopping Center Opening in 2025
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Right now, the vast patch of dirt punctuated with steel girders and concrete floors doesn’t look like more than a metal skeleton rising from the desert.
But in a little more than one year, the Blvd shopping center will be filled with flagship locations whose storefronts will loom five stories over Las Vegas Boulevard in the middle of the country’s casino capital.
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Construction on the 400,000-square-foot development with 700 feet of street frontage began early this year, and a topping-out ceremony was planned for Thursday with the owners, New York businessman Eli Gindi and his business partners, Andrew and Peggy Cherng, the cofounders of Panda Express, celebrating the event.
It’s a special moment because the project has faced some serious roadblocks. In 2019, Gindi Capital, whose principals are Eli and Jeffrey Gindi, spent $172 million for the land once occupied by the aging Hawaiian Marketplace. Big plans were on the board for tall flagship buildings facing the Strip and rooftop eateries and entertainment.
But then the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020. When everyone emerged from isolation and business inched back to normal, another hurdle appeared. “Interest rates went through the roof,” Gindi said, with an air of exasperation. “It was going to cost a fortune to build!”
Luckily, he knew Andrew Cherng, who at one time had considered buying that property, across from the Waldorf Astoria Hotel his family trust owns. “Andrew told me, ‘You know it kills me I didn’t buy that property,’” Gindi recounted. So Gindi ended up resolving his financing problems with the Cherng Family Trust buying 50 percent of the development.
Construction began in January to make way for 300,000 square feet in retail and 100,000 square feet dedicated to rooftop dining. So far, three major retailers have signed on. Puma and H&M have each pledged taking 20,000 square feet of space with Adidas signing a lease for 25,000 square feet. “And here we are,” Gindi said. “Off to the races.”
This particular side of the Strip at 3743-3759 Las Vegas Boulevard is a section in transition. In the past, it was filled with aging retail developments even though it sits across from the upscale Cosmopolitan, Aria and Waldorf Astoria hotels, which are centered around luxury-dominated outposts.
Now it is becoming sports central. A few blocks down the road is T-Mobile Center, the hockey stadium opened in 2016 for the Las Vegas Golden Knights expansion team. Not too far away, Allegiant Stadium was unveiled in 2020 to host the Las Vegas (formerly Oakland) Raiders football team, which shares the venue with the University of Nevada, Las Vegas’s college football team. Super Bowl LVIII will be held there in February.
To the north of the Blvd development, a new baseball stadium is expected to be finished by 2028 to accommodate the Oakland A’s, which is leaving Oakland, Calif., and moving to Las Vegas.
Gindi, whose family founded Century 21 Department Stores in the early 1960s, saw an opportunity with Blvd to match the rest of the nearby real estate purchases he has made up and down the Strip. Starting in 2014, Gindi made an investment in the nearby Showcase Mall, which he thought was an underdeveloped shopping center with a ton of potential.
Ten years ago, he surveyed the mall with his business partner, Joe Nakash, whose family founded Jordache Jeans. “So, we went to look at the property. And then he said, ‘Let’s get out of here.’ I said, ‘There are big crowds here.’ There were beautiful stores like M&M’s and Coca-Cola surrounded by a lot of crap. I said, “I am not leaving until we buy this.’”
And they did. They bought one chunk for $145 million and later acquired the rest for an additional $222.4 million, upgrading the mall while keeping the M&M’s and Coca-Cola outposts.
In 2017, Gindi Capital and the Nakash family paid nearly $60 million for the Smith & Wollensky steakhouse north of the Showcase Mall, developing it into a 150,000-square-foot retail center whose tenants include Target, Burlington discount store, a rooftop BrewDog brew pub and the edutainment Paradox Museum.
These developments are the exact opposite of the luxury branded and self-contained centers that over the years grew around high-end hotels including Caesars Palace, the Bellagio, the Wynn, the Venetian and, opening this week, Fontainebleau Las Vegas. Gindi’s investments are street-front properties with establishments catering to mid-range shoppers who can’t afford to buy a Gucci bag for $2,500.
“This was a mature area on that side of the street that had been in flux for a long time. That land near there was assembled about a decade ago and was planned to be an Elvis [Presley-themed] hotel, and then the recession of 2008 and 2009 wiped that out and the project went bankrupt,” said Frank Volk, executive vice president for CBRE/Retail in Las Vegas.
But the area is being revitalized with newer retail projects and major sports stadiums. The recent Formula 1 Grand Prix weekend, held in November during one of Las Vegas’s slowest times of the year, was a big success. More than 300,000 people attended the event, contributing $1.2 billion to the Las Vegas economy. The race will return next year. “Las Vegas historically has been a city of peaks and valleys in terms of occupancy with hotels,” Volk observed. “Now there are multiple events to even things out.”
That will help improve the city’s tourism industry, which is still not at peak. Last year, there were 38.8 million visitors, down nearly 10 percent from the top of 42.9 million in 2016, according to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.
More sports fans crowding into the city’s stadiums will be good news for the Blvd shopping center. “Las Vegas used to be known for one major sporting event — boxing,” said Michael Hirschfeld, vice chairman of Jones Lange Lasalle, or JLL, who oversees leasing for Blvd. “Now there is a whole different level of entertainment.”
Hirschfeld sees retailers in this area being able to capture a wide range of customers, which will help with finding tenants. The JLL retail real estate broker said 20 percent of the Blvd is leased and another 30 percent of the project should be leased in the next 60 to 90 days.
Unfinished spaces are expected to be delivered to new tenants by August for interior buildouts, with an opening set for early 2025.
“If you look at that section of Las Vegas Boulevard, it’s a wonderful cross section of basically the population that comes through Las Vegas,” Hirschfeld said. “And I think a lot of retailers are just starting to realize that.”
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