Not many retail brokers lease space anywhere near their clients. But Tim Bloom’s office sits directly above a new Panera Bread restaurant under construction in St. Paul’s Highland Village. He will be so close he’ll likely smell the treats from the bakery. Panera represents a new client for Tim, who along with his son, Josh, split off from the local office of CBRE about a year ago to start Bloom Commercial Real Estate (BCRE). One of the first deals the Blooms did together was take over management of the Highland Center, on the southeast corner of Ford and Cleveland, and lure Panera to it.

 

“We’ve completed our first year and exceeded our projections,” said Tim Bloom, formerly a first vice president at CBRE. “Our clients have come to us for representation in the Twin Cities and the Midwest.” 

 

BCRE just launched its website to tap into a larger client base, but so far its success has come by flying under Google’s radar. Josh, 34, and Tim decided to start a boutique firm after more than a few clients suggested that they launch a venture and that they would follow them. As it turns out, they did. Clients such as Perkins, Verizon, Wow! (Work Out World!), Palm Beach Tan and Noodles & Co.work with the Blooms.

 

They also are working on repositioning several strip shopping centers in Anoka, Champlin, Shoreview and Suburban Avenue in St. Paul. In Rochester, Maplewood Square has been repositioned. through remodeling and a marketing campaign, which attracted Wow! and National American University and helped to renew Best Buy’s lease. Another 25,000 square feet are to be filled. Richard Kvanbeck, vice president for retail asset management at Eden Prairie-based IRET Properties, which owns Maplewood Square, has known Tim Bloom for years.

When Rainbow Foods left, the strip center couldn’t attract another grocer so Bloom found National American, WOW! and a nail salon.

 

“He’s good because he’s had a long, long career in the retail industry, and he’s worked on a lot of projects,” Kvanbeck said. “He works with you on a personal basis, not just a professional one. And he’s thorough, conscientious and good at seeing a deal through.”

 

People who work with Tim Bloom call him a “character,” for good reason. He offers advice in Yiddish over lunch to his friend and fellow retail broker, John Trautz, who can’t understand a word of it. He writes contractual addendums to make amusing demands — in one case re- questing that an Augusta, Ga., businessman who bought land in the Twin Cities take him golfing at Augusta National Golf Course, home of the Masters. Later, he took a trip to Augusta. Trautz, a commercial retail broker in Minneapolis, said Bloom’s “biggest asset is he’s been on both sides of the table — he’s owned property and he’s leased it. He’s good at bringing people together to complete a transaction.” 

 

Tim Bloom, a history major in college, considers himself a student of retail trends and predicts the continuing appeal of lifestyle centers in the suburbs as well as the movement of national retailers with smaller footprints moving into the cities and suburbs. Moreover, health care centers are becoming part of every retail neighborhood. The restaurants and retailers that bill themselves as part of local neighborhoods, and scale their stores to fit their audiences, will succeed, he said. He points to Trader Joe’s, which offers itself as a neighborhood grocery store. The same is true of restaurant chains such as Smashburger and Panera Bread, which use the word “neighborhood” in their marketing. Family chain restaurants have changed in another significant way, said Bloom, by having liquor licenses to sell beer and wine, a feature that singles and parents like.

 

Although alcohol doesn’t represent a large percentage of sales at chain restaurants, the “perception” of them has been transformed in the consumer’s mind to one with a more comfortable sensibility. “If someone wants to have a beer they can; it’s a feel-good ancillary service,” Josh Bloom said.

 

Josh Bloom calls his dad a “legend,” and Tim hardly shrinks from the label, declaring he had a role in “reshaping the retail landscape in the Twin Cities.” To prove his point, he ticked off the big deals that marked his career — a five-year project to place IKEA near the Mall of America; a role in the creation of the West End in St. Louis Park; the Best Buy World Headquarters in Richfield and the Shops at Lyndale. His client list is a veritable who’s who of retailers that have entered the Twin Cities market — REI, Perkins, Blockbuster, Galyan’s, the Limited, Bath & Body Works, Krispy Kreme, U.S. Bank Trust, Ryan Cos., Wendy’s International Inc. and Wells Fargo Trust.

 

He worked several deals late in his career with Josh at his side. Tim Bloom counts himself lucky to still be in the business. Camping in the Boundary Waters in 1992 with Josh and his daughter, Lindsey Jo, he lit a camp stove and it blew up. The fire severely burned his legs and arms and resulted in a host of other medical issues. His son and daughter took him by canoe to a ranger station, and he was airlifted to a hospital in Grand Marais. A Hollywood screenwriter tried and failed to get the
story made into a movie. 

 

Now within walking distance of their homes, the Blooms are working in an office in a neighborhood where they grew up and have lived most of their lives. Tim Bloom has been thinking a bit about the fate of the Ford Motor Co. plant that will soon close. Of course, he’s thinking of potential deals.

 

“If they do any retail there, we will have plenty of national companies lining up to get in,” he said. “The Ford plant is the best development opportunity now going on in the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul.”

 

Originally published in November 2011 by Finance & Commerce.