Still No Takers for Empty Stores

Businesses within a block of the South Orange train station don't tend to languish on the market for long, but a stretch of storefronts further east on South Orange Avenue, past Village Hall, continues month after month to be sheeted in black plastic with contact info for leasing agents displayed prominently in the window.

While the presence of Diamond Cleaners & Laundromat breaks up the flow of empty storefronts, four businesses between 125 South Orange Ave. and 131B South Orange Ave. stand conspicuously vacant. Those responsible for leasing them say they've dropped their prices substantially, but to no avail so far.

According to Lew Finkelstein, an agent for The Goldstein Group, which represents 125 and 127 South Orange Ave., the properties have been vacant for the year and a half that he's had the listings, though he did successfully rent Rita's Water Ice at 121 South Orange Ave. for the same owners last winter. Though they've since lowered the price from $38 to $30 per square foot, he says potential renters are "still resistant."

"South Orange itself is not a draw you're going to get a national tenant for," said Finkelstein, who noted that he had found two tenants—a 24-hour fitness center and a hookah cafe—that the Village denied use permits for. (According to Village Administrator John Gross, those uses weren't permitted under South Orange's zoning ordinance.)

Patty Abeles, owner of 131 South Orange Ave., which has been in her family since her mother opened an Acme supermarket there in the 1940s, has lowered her price from $25 to $20 per square foot for the A and B storefronts. (The C storefront is currently occupied by the salon Jesse's Shear Genius.) She says she's had ups and downs in her quests to find tenants for the two vacant stores.

Storefront B was last occupied by a Verizon franchisee, and after that tenant vacated, Abeles says she was tied up in negotiations with Quiznos for a year, which ended this spring when a second franchisee dropped out over concerns about how much they'd have to spend to build out the space.

"I not only lost the year, I lost other opportunities," said Abeles, noting that she was restricted from exploring the possibility of leasing storefront A—last occupied by Beetee Beauty Supply—to a food-related business so long as a deal with Quiznos was still on the table. She's also had deals fall through with Edible Arrangements and My Girlfriend's Kitchen.

"With the economy, maybe people are afraid," she said.

Though the economy doesn't make leasing commercial space any easier, the storefronts' location is also a complicating factor. According to Main Street South Orange's executive director Carole Anzalone-Newman, the fact that the stores face First Presbyterian Church could be making them less attractive to tenants, since the block doesn't necessarily look as much like a shopping destination as one that's "double loaded" with stores on either side of the street. And though there's a municipal parking lot next to the church and another beside Village Hall, there's a perception that parking is challenging in the area.

"It's a constant issue for us—we're constantly telling people things like, you've got to walk a block," said Anzalone-Newman, who thinks that retailers catering to Seton Hall students would be ideal for the vacant spaces.

Gross pointed out that there are visual obstacles to renting out the spaces, since the train station isn't visible from that part of South Orange Avenue.

"It's not prime space downtown," he said. "You go just down to the next block and everything is filled or quickly filled."