Local shopping havens raking it in

Alicia Robinson

There’s apparently no problem with consumer confidence here, as

retail giants South Coast Plaza and Fashion Island are reporting

double-digit increases over last year’s sales.

“We are on fire,” said Nina Robinson, vice president of marketing

for the Irvine Co.’s retail properties, which include Fashion Island,

Crystal Cove Promenade and the Bluffs. “We’re expecting sales that

are extremely strong across the board pretty much at all our retail

properties.”

The shopping centers attributed their success to the strength of

luxury boutiques such as Gucci and Cartier, children’s retailers and

home furnishings and accessories stores.

Representatives from Fashion Island and South Coast Plaza would

not provide specific sales figures but claim increases of at least

10% in month-to-month comparisons with 2003 sales.

“We had our best year ever in terms of sales increases in 2003,”

said Debra Gunn Downing, South Coast Plaza’s marketing director.

“We’re on track to do better [in 2004] as it stands now.”

Last year, South Coast Plaza reported $1.1 billion in taxable

sales, and Fashion Island’s 2003 sales rang in at $481 million.

Those ringing cash registers mean sales-tax revenue that’s

boosting the budgets of Newport Beach and Costa Mesa, but some of it

may be siphoned off to fill holes in the state’s 2005 budget.

Newport Beach expects to collect $20.9 million in sales and use

taxes this fiscal year, which ends June 30, Deputy Administrative

Services Director Dick Kurth said. In 2005, the city is projecting

sales taxes to increase by 3%.

In Costa Mesa, sales taxes this year are projected at $37.5

million and a 3.74% increase is forecast for next year, city Finance

Director Marc Puckett said.

Both cities, however, are uncertain how much they’ll actually

collect next year because of an agreement that allows the state to

take 25% of cities’ sales-tax revenue in 2005 and replace it with

property-tax revenue, which the state will also reduce through a

separate budget provision.

And while the sales reports from retail centers sound good now,

city officials aren’t doing back flips yet. Puckett said the growth

rate of Costa Mesa’s sales tax has dwindled from nearly 8% annual

growth from 1995 to 2000 to a modest 1.9% annual growth for the last

three years.

“One quarter [of strong sales] does not make a year,” he said.

“We’ll see what happens at the end of the year.”

* ALICIA ROBINSON covers business, politics and the environment.

She may be reached at (949) 764-4330 or by e-mail at

[email protected].