Dick’s Sporting Goods hunts for large space, for first Manhattan store, sources say

The rapidly expanding big-box retailer Dick’s Sporting Goods is looking at large, multi-story locations including 1333 Broadway in Herald Square and 3 Columbus Circle in Midtown to open its first store in Manhattan, several industry sources said.

The Pittsburgh, Penn.-based company opened more than 50 stores between the start of 2011 and mid-January 2012, when it reported it had 480 locations in the United States.

The sporting goods retailer is searching for large locations of about 40,000 square feet to 66,000 square feet, sources say, as Manhattan retail rents are generally on the rise, according to a new report released last week from commercial brokerage CBRE Group.

Patrick Smith, executive vice president at SRS Real Estate Partners, who is representing Dick’s Sporting Goods, did not respond to requests for comment. Leasing agents or representatives for 1333 Broadway, owned by W&H Properties, and 3 Columbus Circle, owned by SL Green Realty and the Moinian Group, either declined to comment or did not respond to requests for comment.

Retail broker Faith Hope Consolo, chairman of retail sales and leasing at Prudential Douglas Elliman, expected the company to open near a competitor like Paragon Sports at 867 Broadway near Union Square or Recreational Equipment, at the Puck Building in Soho.

She is not involved in any of the sport retailer’s negotiations, but speculated the company would open a store in Soho, Union Square or Columbus Circle, “where there are sneakers, and sweatpants and sports enthusiasts,” Consolo said.

The asking rent for the 61,927 square feet at 1333 Broadway, also known as 3 Herald Square, is $400 per foot to $500 per foot on the ground floor; about $125 per foot to $150 per foot on the ground floor, and about $75 per foot on the lower level, a source said. A CBRE team is representing the space, and a company spokesperson declined to comment.

The asking rent for 3 Columbus Circle was not available. Data from leasing information firm CoStar Group shows Newmark Knight Frank is marketing 6,339 square feet on the ground floor and 40,407 square feet on the second floor.

CBRE’s most recent retail data for Manhattan shows asking rents rising in the Herald Square area (34th Street between Fifth and Seventh avenues) by 3.6 percent to $499 per square foot in the fourth quarter compared with the prior quarter. While the report does not cover Columbus Circle, rents in the center of Times Square (Broadway to Seventh Avenue from 42nd to 47th streets), asking
jumped by 17.7 percent to $1,700 per foot, also in the fourth quarter compared with the third quarter, CBRE figures show. That was the highest jump among the 11 submarket CBRE tracks.

Manhattan’s most expensive district remained Upper Fifth Avenue, from 49th to 59th street, where asking rents were $2,550 per foot, a 9.1 percent jump in the fourth quarter. The largest decline was seen in Soho (Broadway from Houston to Broome streets), where asking rents fell 4.1 percent in the fourth quarter to $475 per foot from the previous quarter, the CBRE data says.

Recreational Equipment, known as REI, opened its first New York City location in Soho last December at 295 Lafayette Street.

The only Dick’s Sporting Goods location now in New York City is in Staten Island at 2505 Richmond Avenue. Last year, the company opened a location in the mall Westchester’s Ridge Hill at 45 Fitzgerald Street, in Yonkers, next door to an REI location.

The company plans to announce its corporate earnings tomorrow.