Pho restaurant headed uptown

Brevard Court, the outdoor row adjoining Latta Arcade uptown, will soon have a new restaurant serving Pho, the Vietnamese soup.

The restaurant, called Pho Plus, is going into the space formerly occupied by China King (whose name is still on the awning). The restaurant doesn't give an opening date.

Here's a Wikipedia definition of pho, if you're not familiar: "Pho is a Vietnamese noodle soup consisting of broth, linguine-shaped rice noodles called bánh phở, a few herbs, and meat."

Brevard Court still has several unfilled spaces, including the store left empty when Alexander Hats moved to a new location off East W.T. Harris Blvd. The opening of Romare Bearden Park across the street, along with the planned new minor league ballpark next door, should add to Brevard Court's traffic.

But the older retail strip also faces more competition from new food spots that have opened up nearby, including the Mellow Mushroom a stone's throw away. What do you think of Brevard Court and the tenant mix there now?

Elements Massage adding Dilworth franchise

A local franchisee is opening a second Elements Massage location in Charlotte, this one in the Kenilworth Commons shopping center in Dilworth.

The location was formerly a dry cleaning store. Elements plans to open Saturday, Jan.18.

"What sets us apart is our dedication to listening to clients’ needs in order to pair them with the right massage therapist," said Lucy Anderson, a Charlotte native and owner of the new Elements. "We identify key details such as type of massage desired, specific pressure needs and individual issues before matching clients and therapists."

The store will be open seven days a week, and accepts walk-in clients. Elements joins other massage studios in Dilworth, such as Zen Massage, Dilworth Bodyworks and Day Break Massage.

Elements opened its first Charlotte franchise in 2011, near SouthPark mall.

Rack Room Shoes closing at Park Road Shopping Center

The Rack Room Shoes located in Park Road Shopping Center is closing, adding to the list of merchants closing their doors at Charlotte's original suburban retail center.

The shoe store's last day of business is set for Saturday, an employee said. Everything is 50 percent off for the location's closing sale.

There are a half-dozen other Rack Room locations in Charlotte. The Park Road one is the closest to uptown and the city's central neighborhoods.

Park Road Shopping Center was bought by EDENS more than two years ago for $82 million. Since then, the new owners have given the 58-year-old shopping center a face lift, with new finishes, a redone parking lot and other renovations.

But smaller merchants have also complained about rising rents under the new owners, as my colleague Eric Frazier wrote about in September. Since then, other businesses including Roland's Salon and Piedmont Music Center, have closed at Park Road.

What do you think of the changes at Park Road Shopping Center, both to the way the center looks and to the merchant mix?

Food Lion piloting 'sealed-fresh' beef

This week, a reader called the Observer with an interesting question about Salisbury-based Food Lion's plans for its meat counters: Is the company planning to get rid of them?

The questioner had noticed the meat counter being removed at his local Cornelius store. We asked Food Lion spokeswoman Christy Phillips-Brown, who said no, that meat counter is just being switched to a different model "to make it more consistent with cases in our other stores."

Phillips-Brown said the company is running a pilot program at its Roanoke-area stores with new "sealed-fresh" beef products. Vacuum-packed in individual plastic, the cuts of beef arrive ready-to-sell at each store, meaning there's no need to cut meat in-store.

That frees up meat managers to possibly assume other duties, Phillips-Brown said. The pilot program hasn't run long enough to know what customers think or whether sealed-fresh beef will spread, she
said.

Click here for a November story from WSLS in Roanoke, in which Food Lion director of operations Rob Ward discusses the merits of sealed beef. It stays fresher longer, and no spilled blood from any packages in your refrigerator, said Ward.

Ward said the program is in 61 Roanoke-area stores. In the WSLS story, you can watch him and another Food Lion market manager grill a steak.

The packages resemble what you get at Trader Joe's, which doesn't have in-store butchering, but sells vacuum-packed individual cuts of beef.

Food Lion is a subsidiary of Belgian grocery conglomerate Delhaize. The company is attempting to improve its results and increase its market share under new CEO Beth Newlands Campbell, who put it simply in August: "We just have to get better."

Trader Joe's at Rivergate? Nope, sorry

Rivergate Shopping Center in Steele Creek is expanding, and a reader emailed me Wednesday to check out a rumor: That a new Trader Joe's would be a tenant.

Turns out that rumor isn't true, according to John Dosser of Childress Klein Properties, the developer expanding Rivergate. "I can confirm that Trader Joe's is not a tenant we are currently working with," Dosser said via email.

Childress Klein announced the expansion in November. The Shops at Rivergate South, as its known, will be 150,000 square feet, on 22 acres adjacent to Rivergate. Anchor tenants include HomeGoods, Michaels and Ulta Beauty. The expansion is slated to open in late summer.

There are three Trader Joe's stores in Charlotte (map), one each in the city's north, south and near uptown. Where do you think Trader Joe's should build more stores?


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Alexander Scott moving to Myers Park Center

Alexander Scott, the interior store that's been a fixture on East Blvd. for three years, plans to move next month to a new space on Providence Road.

The current store, located in the gated McColl building at 208 East Blvd., will close on Jan. 31, co-owner David Newcombe said. The new location is in the former Paul Simon store on Providence Road, in the Myers Park Center next to the new Mega Harris Teeter. Newcombe expects to open in early February.



"We love the building, but East Blvd. is a tough street to be on," said Newcombe. Many of Alexander Scott's customers come from Myers Park and Eastover. "We're not on their beaten path. We're going to go to their neighborhood so we can be more accessible to them."

The new store will be smaller than the current location, with 25 vendors selling home goods and accessories. That's down from 70 at the East Blvd. store. Newcombe said that the smaller space offered a chance to pare the store's selection.

"I really wanted to streamline it and bring the best of the best," he said. "If it's too big, it becomes very redundant."

Alexander Scott is a multi-merchant store, meaning multiple vendors lease space to sell their goods there. Other multi-merchant stores in Charlotte include Blacklion and Slate.


"Multi-merchant marketplaces are everywhere, so it's paramount we set ourselves apart," said Newcombe.
 

Revolution moving from EpiCentre to East Blvd.

An uptown apparel retailer is moving from its EpiCentre location to a new store on East Boulevard next week, after five years at the mixed-use entertainment complex.

Revolution plans to close its EpiCentre location on Jan. 15. Its new store is located at East Blvd. and Cleveland Street, in a renovated building. The East Blvd. store will carry premium denim and designer clothes for men and women, as well as jewelry, shoes, accessories and gifts.

Here's a picture of the new Revolution shop, from their Facebook page. The building has been extensively redone over the past few months, and is set to open on Thursday.

227 East Boulevard

Revolution is running sales at its uptown store until the location closes.

Uptown's relatively small retail selection has long been a sore point with many (I used to live uptown about four years ago, and I had to drive out of uptown to buy anything besides food). What do you think about the uptown retail scene? Do you think there are enough residents and visitors to support more stores now?