A new retail strip center in the Broadmoor Village Shopping Center is beginning to take shape after encountering permitting delays, with two of six tenants signed on so far.
Parker’s Pharmacy, the first of three locations planned in Baton Rouge for the new local business, is the second tenant announced for the 7,500-square-foot building after Wingstop signed on in March.
The pharmacy is owned by Orlando Palmer and his brother Kyle Palmer. Orlando Palmer currently operates a PETNET radiopharmacy location in Covington, but says he wants to move back home and open a neighborhood pharmacy.
“That Broadmoor/Sherwood area is great, and it needs an independent pharmacy,” Palmer says. “It really doesn’t matter if there’s a big box retailer like Walgreens or CVS in the area. CVS and Walgreens can’t provide the customer service that a neighborhood pharmacy can.”
Palmer hopes to pull permits for the build out soon and have the doors open by September. He has also nailed down two more locations in Baton Rouge, but declined to say where they will be. He is aiming to open the next one in early 2018 and another location in 2019.
Austin Earhart, the leasing agent for the development, says he is working on signing three more tenants in addition to Parker’s and Wingstop, but declined to name them.
Wingstop received its permit June 28 and will soon begin construction on a roughly 1,800-square-foot end space, a project that will cost around $220,000, according to the construction permit.
Construction on the building began late last year and finished roughly three weeks ago, Earhart says.
“We’re pretty delayed on this because the permit took forever,” he says. “We get a lot of calls on this space. We’ve got two or three more tenants identified.”
Developers of the shopping center bought the land for $1.5 million in 2010 and have redeveloped the area for several years. In 2014 they leased a 28,000-square-foot space to Hi Nabor Supermarket. Planet Fitness also has a location at the site.
The strip center, at Florida Boulevard and Cora Drive, is adjacent to the 80,000-square-foot shopping center. The retail space sits on the site of a former gas station.
—Sam Karlin
