BSD okays hiring new retail tenant recruiter

The Birmingham Principal Shopping District (BSD) board, at their monthly meeting on Thursday, March 7, approved a one-year contract with CC Consulting to act as a third party retail recruiter to assist them in recruiting national and regional retailers and to help them locate and establish a retail operation in downtown Birmingham.

CC Consulting of Bloomfield Hills is a consulting firm specializing in offering retail attraction, marketing and public relations. Its principal, Cindy Ciura, has over 25 years in the real estate field, and has been involved with high profile retail developments and urban revitalizations locally and across the country. The contract with CC Consulting is dated February 27, 2019, for one year, can be terminated by either party with 30 days notice, and is not to exceed $25,000 annually, plus insurance.

CC Consulting will not be paid any commissions, bonuses, fees or any other type of payments from any other parties involved with leasing spaces in Birmingham, although there is an incentive clause within the agreement, which varies, providing a premium to the recruiter if the tenant is a retail operation on a target list developed by the BSD that outlines categories of retail preferred for the downtown area.

“Since the BSD's ambition is to recruit multiple tenants in a given year, a dynamic compensation structure was created that incentivizes the recruiter to close several deals,” BSD Executive Director Ingrid Tighe said.

Prior to the hiring of CC Consulting, the BSD had retained The Buxton Company of Ft. Worth, Texas, in November 2017, for one year, to handle tenant recruitment for the downtown retail district, after seven years utilizing independent retail leasing consultant Julie Fielder.

“The BSD hired Buxton to obtain data and analytics to identify strong prospective retailers for downtown. The BSD decided to use the relevant information we have and continue to gain traction on recruiting retailers from the initial list of prospective retailers provided,” Tighe said. “The next step in the BSD's strategy is to retain CC Consulting, which has a strong network and deep retail real estate expertise in the region. By leveraging CC Consulting's assets and Buxton's data, the BSD can proactively meet with potential retailers and make a strong business case for why a retailer would be a great fit in downtown Birmingham.”