By Jack Tomczuk<\/p>\n
The Center City District<\/a> wants more national brands to consider opening up locations in Philadelphia\u2019s downtown, and it has the data to back it up.<\/p>\n In a report released this week<\/a>, the organization, which promotes the area and works to attract new businesses, analyzed Center City\u2019s retail industry, compared it to shopping districts in other major cities and surveyed residents about where they want to spend their money.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat we’ve seen in our research is there’s such a big gap between the retail that’s offered in Center City and the retail that’s desired by downtown stakeholders,\u201d said Clint Randall, CCD\u2019s vice president of economic development and an author of the report.<\/p>\n A forthcoming survey of around 700 downtown apartment dwellers found that more than half do not own cars. But, of those with vehicles, 72% said they needed them to travel to shopping destinations in the suburbs and elsewhere, Randall said.\u00a0<\/p>\n The most-requested stores, according to a separate poll of Center City shoppers, are Zara, Nordstrom and Bloomingdale\u2019s. Zara closed a location<\/a> on Walnut Street in 2019, while the other two brands operate outlet-style versions downtown.<\/p>\n CCD\u2019s report pitches the Rittenhouse Square neighborhood as a particularly enticing spot for companies looking to expand into Philadelphia.<\/p>\n The 19103 zip code is the 10th wealthiest in the nation, and more than 60,000 people live within a 15-minute walk of the Walnut Street shopping district, a higher population than comparable corridors in Boston, San Francisco, Chicago and Washington D.C., according to the analysis.<\/p>\n \u201cI really think that this reinforces that this incredible spending power that we have in Center City is not being entirely captured in Center City,\u201d Randall said.<\/p>\n Randall and the CCD team view Market Street, on both sides of City Hall, as an opportunity for business expansion, potentially for those companies searching for larger footprints.\u00a0<\/p>\n The corridor is \u201cunderperforming,\u201d added Jimmy Salfiti, CCD\u2019s manager of economic development, compared to downtown stretches of Chestnut and Walnut streets, with a storefront vacancy rate of 32%.<\/p>\n