Rogers? Pinnacle Hills Promenade to Be 856,300 SF

Planners for Pinnacle Hills Promenade, the anticipated retail complex in Rogers, have more than doubled the project’s size and moved it southeast across Interstate 540, developers announced on Feb. 5.

Bill Schwyhart, a principle in The Pinnacle Group, said the final decision to expand the project, scheduled to open in fall 2006, was made about six months ago.

Originally expected to be a 300,000-SF shopping and dining center on Pinnacle Hills Parkway, the project now will be a more than 856,300-SF “lifestyle mecca” at the northeast corner of Perry Road and I-540. It will be southeast of the site where Mercy Health Systems plans to build its new 500,000-SF hospital, and designs are in the works to add interstate access ramps at Perry Road.

The build-out value of the Promenade is expected to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, but an official figure has not been released. When fully developed, the entire Pinnacle Hills Complex — about 400 acres of prime real estate in west Rogers — will be more than 1 million SF of office and retail space, Schwyhart said.

“We started thinking about it immediately after coming back last year from the ICSC [International Council of Shopping Centers] conference in Las Vegas,” Schwyhart said. “We started lining up visits with national retailers and restaurants, and we had such an overwhelming response. We had titans of the industry telling us that we weren’t thinking big enough. They made some strong suggestions that we take on a national retail development partner, and that’s what’s gotten us where we are today.”

Pinnacle/GGP Partnership

The Pinnacle Group is an investment holding company that already had an estimated $100 million in assets through its more than 20 limited liability companies. It’s led by principals J.B. Hunt, Tim Graham, Robert Thornton and Schwyhart.

A news conference at the Embassy Suites hotel in Rogers confirmed recent reports that publicly traded General Growth Properties Inc. of New York has partnered with The Pinnacle Group to build the Promenade and that Little Rock-based Dillard’s Inc. will build a store at the complex.

General Growth is a publicly traded real estate investment trust traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “GGP.” It’s one of the nation’s largest shopping center owners, managers and developers. It has an interest in or management responsibilities for more than 172 regional shopping malls in 41 states.

The firm’s portfolio includes more than 146 million SF of retail space and more than 16,000 suppliers. General Growth built the Galleria malls in Dallas and St. Louis, the Ala Moana mall in Honolulu and the Stonebriar Centre complex in Frisco, Texas, where its tenants include such retailers as Macy’s, Nordstrom and Restoration Hardware.

“We were courted by some of the best retail developers in the United States today,” Schwyhart said. “General Growth came to the partnership because we really liked their project in Frisco, Texas, and John Q. Hammons said that they are a blue-chip company that would take this project to the next level and deliver everything we are wanting to achieve in Northwest Arkansas.

“That made the decision easy for us.”

Dillard’s to Build Store

General Growth has received an equity stake in the Promenade, and Schwyhart said that makes them an equal partner.

“They are equity holders in the community now, and they will pursue this with the same visions and goals that we have,” Schwyhart said.

As an anchor tenant, Dillard’s will have a two-story store at the Promenade, occupying 165,000 SF. The Promenade will include a 170,000-SF “power center” that’s set off to the side of the main facility.

The Pinnacle Group recently unified its holdings by buying out the estimated 25 percent interest held by prominent developer and architect Collins Haynes in two of the group’s signature subsidiaries: the $60 million Pinnacle Point Properties LLC and the $10 million Pinnacle Air Group LLC.

Pinnacle Point is 300,000 SF of class “A” office and retail space, and Pinnacle Air, with three multimillion-dollar Learjets, is the state’s largest charter service.

Hunt founded J.B. Hunt Transport Services Inc. in Lowell where Graham was also an executive. Schwyhart is an entrepreneur and former BMW dealer, and Thornton was one of Sam Walton’s early executives at Wal-Mart Stores Inc.

Other existing and announced infrastructure in the Pinnacle area includes:

• A $45 million Embassy Suites in Rogers, a 250-room hotel developed by John Q. Hammons Inc. that opened last May.

• Hammons’ $60 million plan to build a 250-room Marriott that will adjoin both the Embassy Suites and a 105,000-SF Pinnacle Hills Convention Center with 24,000 SF of meeting space.

• Fifty-five acres of commercial and 20 acres of multifamily property on the northeast corner of the I-540/New Hope interchange is being planned by Pinnacle. Schwyhart said the commercial area is being developed for a “big-box retailer.”

• Mercy’s $140 million, 200-bed hospital.