Columbus metropolitan area now attracting nation's most selective retailers

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February 13, 2008, Columbus, Ohio - Officials at The Georgetown Company and Steiner + Associates, co-developers of Easton Town Center, today announced that Tiffany & Co., the internationally renowned jeweler, will open a store at Easton in November 2008. In addition, Henri Bendel will expand to create "A Bigger, Better Bendel" at the corner of New Bond St and The Strand immediately adjacent to the future Tiffany & Co. store.

"Today's announcement affirms Columbus as a metropolitan community worthy of the highest caliber and most selective retail," said Adam Flatto, president of The Georgetown Company. "This opens doors for other new retail to come to central Ohio, and reinforces the impact Easton Town Center is having on the region's ability to compete nationally."

Since 1837, Tiffany & Co. has been the world's premier jeweler and America's house of design. The approximately 6,200-square-foot Easton Town Center store will feature an array of TIFFANY & CO. collections, including exquisite diamond engagement rings; jewels of ultimate glamour; fine and sterling silver jewelry; the celebrated designs of Elsa Peretti, Paloma Picasso, Jean Schlumberger and Frank Gehry; signature collections such as Tiffany Atlas® and Tiffany 1837™; as well as watches, gifts and accessories.

"Easton Town Center is the most desirable location in this region for a Tiffany & Co. store," said Beth O. Canavan, executive vice president of Tiffany & Co. "In addition to its open, inviting environment and its many amenities, the center draws many customers from across the central Ohio region, which we know to be a top-tier retail market."

Henri Bendel, New York's legendary Fifth Avenue boutique, is a "Girls' Playground" for trendsetting young women from around the world. The existing Easton Town Center store located at 4120 The Strand is currently the only location in existence outside of the original store in New York.

As part of the corner redevelopment, Henri Bendel closed shop at the end of the day on Saturday, February 2nd, in order to open again later this fall with "A Bigger, Better Bendel", that will showcase the Henri Bendel brand focusing on accessories, home fragrance and personal care products. As the brand is positioned for growth, owner Limited Brands also recently unveiled an e-commerce site at www.henribendel.com

"We are excited to give our Columbus shoppers a bigger, better Bendel's store with a new look and an expanded collection of accessories, home fragrance and personal care products," said Leslie Wexner, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Limited Brands. "We look forward to sharing our grand reopening celebration with you this fall."

As part of the combined project, Tiffany & Co will replace J. Jill and VSX, both of which are moving to The Strand in the spaces formerly occupied by Guess and Intimissimi. Victoria's Secret stores will continue to carry Intimissimi products. Additionally, Henri Bendel will expand its existing footprint to nearly 3,000 square feet.

As both Tiffany and Bendel will be larger than the existing tenant spaces, roadwork is necessary in order to move the street and the sidewalk closer to the North District fountain. This roadwork has already begun, with store construction following shortly.

Flatto continued, "In order to remain as fresh as possible, we never allow Easton to simply stand still. As we did with Crate and Barrel, Coldwater Creek, Puma, Potbelly, Mitchell's Ocean Club, and the new Easton Station office building, we always work to reinvent and grow, and where necessary, make significant infrastructure changes as Easton evolves."

The announcement of these new tenants marks the continuation of a strategy to increase new-to-market and exclusive tenants within existing square footage at Easton.

In the past year alone, Easton has added the following tenants:

- Coldwater Creek
- Fahlgren Inc.
- Lacoste
- Lynd's Gourmet
- Puma
- Swarovski
- VSX
- west elm
- WomanKind

About Easton Town Center and Easton

Easton Town Center was co-developed by The Georgetown Company, Steiner + Associates and Limited Brands. Opened in June 1999, Easton is a 1.7 million square-foot 'New Urban Retail' center that features pedestrian-friendly streetscapes, open-air gathering spaces, fountains and parks for children, in addition to over 160 best-of-class retail, entertainment and dining tenants. The International Council of Shopping Centers honored Easton with its Innovative Design Award in 2000. The development draws more than 20 million visits annually and is on the internet at www.eastontowncenter.com.

Easton Town Center sits within the larger 1,300-acre "Easton" development, a 12 million square-foot mixed-use development undertaken by The Georgetown Company and Limited Brands, Inc. since 1994. With over 7 million square feet of retail, office hotel and residential properties already complete, Easton has in this time become a dominant destination for commercial activity in Columbus and throughout the entire central Ohio region. With 25,000+ employees already in place, Easton will eventually be home to over 40,000 employees.

August 17, 2007 – Columbus, OH - - Shadowbox ensemble members took a break from their normal, hectic rehearsal schedule to host some very special guests, Thursday, August 16th.  Thirty children from The Salvation Army West Mound Learning Center were invited to take a backstage tour and participate in a comedy workshop lead by performers and comedy writers David Whitehouse and Jimmy Mak.

Valerie Johnson, a coordinator at the center, made arrangements for the kids as one of their summer camp field trips.  “When Valerie contacted me I was thrilled to oblige,” said Katy Psenicka, Shadowbox Operations Manager and Director of Media Relations.  “Shadowbox has long been interested in expanding our community outreach.  I saw this as a great opportunity to do just that.”

While the Shadowbox schedule makes outings such as this difficult they are well worth it, says Psenicka.  “It’s important to us to find new ways to share what we do with our community.  Whether we do that through hosting tours and workshops for kids or through offering our space and our talent for fundraisers we think we have a lot to offer and we feel really good about being able to give to these worthy endeavors.”

Whitehouse and Mak showed the group the inner-workings of the backstage area and then lead them in a workshop where they learned about physical comedy.  Both actors are well-known for their expertise with physical schtick and had the children first watch, and then perform one of Shadowbox’s famous “Jason’s Scary Stories.”

“It was awesome!” said Mak.  “Each kid got to act out ‘Jason’s’ story with David’s instruction.  They got to experience what it’s like to be on our stage under the lights and reacting to my words.”  Whitehouse laughs, “And they got to experience first hand what it feels like to do a prat-fall on our stage!”

Shadowbox will continue to host event such as this time permitting.  Psenicka says, “Not only is it a great opportunity for us to contribute to a worthy cause, it’s really refreshing, and we welcome the change of pace.”

Easton Town Center Re-Acquires Key Retail Locations:
Evolution of Tenant Mix Continues with Addition of Market Exclusives
and Fashion Retailers in Sought After Locations

[Columbus, Ohio] – Officials of The Georgetown Company and Steiner + Associates, co-developers of Easton Town Center, today announced the addition of five new tenants in high profile locations throughout the center.  The new tenants, which include west elm, WomanKind, Coldwater Creek, Lacoste and Swarovski, had been seeking space at Easton for some time but due to the 99% occupancy rate could not open locations here until leased space could be re-acquired by the developers, which had to work out early lease terminations with tenants in most instances.

The announcement of these new tenants marks the continuation of a strategy to increase new-to-market and exclusive high-end tenants within existing square footage at Easton. Announcements will be made in the coming months of more new tenants preparing to join the line up at Easton as additional square footage is re-acquired.

“Demand for retail and office space at Easton has never been better, our occupancy rates are the highest in the Central Ohio market and frankly, have prevented us from meeting retailers’ demand for space here.” said Adam Flatto, general partner at The Georgetown Company, co-developer of Easton Town Center. “This first group of new tenants is fabulous and we expect to announce even more as our acquisition strategy unfolds.”

Flatto continued, “We want our visitor experience to remain as fresh as possible, and our success has enabled us to do that. When these shops and offices open, most will have only one location in central Ohio – at Easton Town Center.”

Recently signed tenants include:

west elm: new to central Ohio, west elm will be located on the first floor of the new four-story mixed-use building on Easton Station road. west elm offers high-end yet affordable home goods to shoppers seeking simple, modern designs. The 10,000 square foot store will carry an assortment of furniture, tabletop, and textile goods in ready-to-assemble units. The store joins over a million square feet of existing home goods retailers at Easton, including Crate and Barrel, Pottery Barn, Restoration Hardware, Williams-Sonoma and many more. west elm is one of seven brands in the Williams-Sonoma family. www.westelm.com

WomanKind: health and wellness center that strives to educate its patients so they may be able to enjoy a fulfilling and healthy life. WomanKind offers a full array of gynecological, obstetrical, urogynecologic, and ancillary services. This medical office tenant will occupy over 8,000 s.f. on the 2nd floor of the new four-story building. (www.womankindhealth.com)

Coldwater Creek: featuring soft woods, ambient lighting and a variety of the best apparel, jewelry, accessories and gifts, Coldwater Creek is a place for professional women to relax and let go of workday stress while shopping for the highest quality goods, from burnished silk jackets to reversible suede belts. The store will occupy 7,000 square feet. (www.coldwatercreek.com)

Lacoste: famously known for its green crocodile logo and its popularity in the 1970’s and 1980’s, Lacoste has emerged in recent years as an international retailer of high-end clothing, footwear, perfume, leather goods, watches, eyewear and of course, tennis shirts. Lacoste will open with 1,800 square feet in the Fall of 2007 adjacent to Pottery Barn in the South District.

Swarovski: is the luxury band name for the range of precision-cut lead crystal glass produced by Swarovski AG from Switzerland. When open, this 500 s.f. store will offer crystal sculptures and miniatures, jewelry and couture, home decor and chandeliers. It will also sell beads and rhinestones, encouraging customers to create their own designs.

Lacoste replaces Motherhood Maternity, Coldwater Creek will go into the former McDonald’s space and Swarovski will take space formerly occupied by Aldo Accessories. Easton was able to obtain these spaces in order to achieve its goal of maximizing new-to-market tenants.

Easton has utilized this flexible approach several times in recent years in order to improve its tenant mix.  Examples of this strategy include the addition of Crate and Barrel, which replaced Virgin Megastore, and Potbelly Sandwich Works, which recently replaced Johnny Rockets. When needed, Easton has purchased the space back from existing tenants.

“With over 30 million visits per year, the performance of Easton’s tenants far surpass the national per square foot sales average,” Flatto continued.  “Many of Easton’s individual tenants are chain wide sales leaders, which in turn creates demand from highly sought after retailers like west elm and Coldwater Creek.  As we look to the future, we are selectively increasing our overall space, but also tweaking existing space to make exciting new things happen.”

About Easton Town Center and Easton
 
Easton Town center was co-developed by The Georgetown Company, Steiner + Associates and Limited Brands. Opened in June 1999, Easton is a 1.7 million square-foot ‘New Urban Retail’ center that features pedestrian-friendly streetscapes, open-air gathering spaces, fountains and parks for children, in addition to over 160 best-of-class retail, entertainment and dining tenants. Easton was honored with an Innovative Design Award by the International Council of Shopping Centers in 2000. The development draws more than 20 million visits annually and is on the internet at www.eastontowncenter.com.

Easton Town Center sits within the 1,300-acre Easton development, a 12 million square-foot mixed-use development undertaken by The Georgetown Company and Limited Brands, Inc. since 1994.  With over 7 million square feet of retail, office hotel and residential properties already complete, Easton has in this time become a dominant destination for commercial activity in Columbus and throughout the entire central Ohio region.  With over 25,000 employees already in place, Easton will eventually have over 40,000 employees at full build-out.

GERMAIN MERCEDES-BENZ AND GERMAIN CADILLAC TO DEBUT AT EASTON:
Dealerships to Redefine the Customer Sales and Service Experience in Central Ohio’s First Luxury Automotive Campus

Columbus, Ohio – The next generation of the luxury automobile shopping experience will be unveiled on December 16th as the widely anticipated Germain Mercedes-Benz and Germain Cadillac campus opens at Easton.  When combined with the Germain Lexus dealership that opened in 2001, Easton now becomes a one-stop shop for customers in the market for best-in-class automobiles.

In November of 2004 Germain Motor Company announced its purchase of approximately 15 acres of land in the north section of Easton Town Center with the intention to develop the parcel with the Mercedes-Benz and Cadillac dealerships as the anchors.

“Our goal was to capture the significant number of high quality customers already coming to Easton through the creation of an automotive campus for luxury car buyers.” said Steve Germain, president and chief executive officer of Germain Motor Company.

“Customers will be able to see the best of the best presented in a way that is unique across the national landscape of car dealerships,” he continued.  “The experience at these new dealerships will directly reflect the brand attributes of the premier automobiles we will offer here.  Furthermore, they will compliment the distinctive upscale environment which has been created at Easton, giving us a unique position to provide the highest quality customer environment in Central Ohio.”

Located adjacent to the existing Germain Lexus dealership near Nordstrom, the new campus is at 4200 – 4300 Morse Crossing and creates a striking landmark at the northern gateway to Easton Town Center.

The large buildings are primarily brick and glass, with two level atriums, well-appointed service waiting areas, a cappuccino bar and other customer amenities.  The dealerships include a two-level parking deck to accommodate vehicle display, vehicle inventory and service parking.

“The addition of Germain Mercedes and Cadillac adds yet another exceptional dimension to Easton,” said Adam Flatto of the Georgetown Company, co-developers of Easton. “The clustering of this aspirational trio of dealerships will create a dominant destination for luxury automotive buying in the region.  We are proud to have worked in a close partnership with the Germains and to have been a part of their vision of auto retailing for the 21st century.”

The opening of the dealerships represents the completion of Phase I of the development of the 15 acres initially purchased by the Germain Motor Company.  Over the next several years, Germain will continue to work with the Georgetown Company to fully develop the remaining property, which is so prominently located within the Easton development. 

As with Germain Lexus, the company is building separate service facilities for the Cadillac and Mercedes dealerships.  In the same fashion, customers may drop off their automobile at the primary campus, and the vehicle will be transported to and from the service facility while the customer enjoys the many amenities within walking distance at Easton.

Founded in 1947, the family-owned Germain Motor Company consists of 16 automotive dealerships in Columbus, as well as Naples and Sarasota, Florida. Central Ohio brands presented by Germain include Toyota, Scion, Ford, Nissan, Mercedes-Benz, Cadillac, Chevrolet and Lexus.