Sometimes a story doesn’t turn out as anticipated.
On the weekend after Macy’s announced it will soon close 40 underperforming stores around the country, including the 243,000-square-foot location at the Mall at Cortana, I went to the mall to see for myself what the crowds were like on a Sunday afternoon and what some of the smaller tenants think about losing yet another anchor.
As expected, the mall was sparsely populated, especially compared to the crowds I would have found across town at the Mall of Louisiana on a weekend afternoon. An estimated 40% of the storefronts are vacant, and a quick walk around seemed to confirm what everyone has been saying for years about the nearly 40-year-old Cortana: Its days as a retail center are limited.
Then I spotted The Café at Cortana, a soul food restaurant with customers fresh from church lined up and waiting to order the Sunday Dinner Special. The restaurant’s owner and operator, Angela Stewart, hustled behind the counter, taking orders and dispensing plates of fried chicken or fried catfish with sides like green beans smothered with sausage and onions, candied yams and freshly baked cornbread.
Here was my interview, I thought: a veteran tenant of the aging mall, who would speak to the worry of the small business owners in Cortana and the steady decline of customers there.
But that’s not the story Stewart told. She is a single mom and an entrepreneur who has made it at Cortana. She sees only good things there, and her optimism suggests there is a potentially vibrant future for the 1 million-square-foot mall—just not, perhaps, as a retail center.
Stewart came to Cortana in 2012, when she relocated there from The Flea Market on Florida Boulevard, where she had first opened her restaurant in 2006. In the more than three years since, her business has grown from two part-time employees to 10 full-time workers. Last year, she opened a bakery and coffee shop, Decadent Creations, in a space near The Café. Next month, she plans to open a third eatery in the mall in a space previously occupied by Monster Burger.
Stewart says her business is bolstered by a steady stream of customers—not just mall shoppers, but students and faculty from Virginia College, which occupies one of the mall’s anchor spaces, and employees from the other small businesses that have taken over vacant storefronts at Cortana. Many of the customers are regulars, but she sees new faces every day.
How has Stewart managed to do so well at an underperforming mall that has seen the departure of so many tenants in recent years and is, today, only about 60% occupied?
She would tell you her good fortune is largely attributable to the grace of God. But she also admits she is gifted in the kitchen, where she uses homemade recipes and fresh produce to come up with her signature dishes.
“I can make burning water taste good,” she says. “God gave me the gift of taste.”
Another important element in Stewart’s success is that she is a born entrepreneur, who loves “stirring pots and making money.” She has a drive and determination that have helped her defy the odds and succeed, despite having grown up in an impoverished neighborhood off Plank Road, and despite winding up three times in a shelter for battered women.
“I didn’t drink or do drugs,” she says, “But I married the wrong man.”
Stewart did have the benefit of an education, having graduated from Scotlandville High School and Southern University. She also had food service experience from Winn Dixie, where she worked in the deli department while in her 20s. It was there that a customer first spotted her talent and asked her to cater a party.
She also grasps the importance of marketing, and promotes The Café tirelessly on both paid and social media. She advertises and tweets and puts herself out there, which brings customers in.
“We have a good business here,” she says. “Everybody here has business.”
Stewart concedes she is concerned about the closure of Macy’s. It’s an anchor tenant, which means it brings traffic to the mall. But she doesn’t see its departure as the death of Cortana.
“You can view it as a glass half empty or a glass half full,” she says. “They bring a lot of customers here, it’s true, but there are other uses for that space and this can be a new opportunity.”
Stewart echoes what local real estate brokers have said about the future of Cortana: To be sustainable, it must diversify its tenant mix and attract more businesses and service providers.
She has a few ideas. She envisions the Macy’s space as a call center or customer service center. She sees smaller vacant spaces transformed into a badly needed child care center, dental and medical offices, a bank branch and even some sort of entertainment venue.
Cortana’s owners, Moonbeam Equities, have diversified the tenant mix at other underperforming retail centers they own around the country. When they bought Cortana in 2013 they indicated it was part of their plan for this market, too. Stewart says it’s time they step up the efforts here because the opportunities are there for those willing to take advantage of them.
“There are plenty of things businesses could bring here,” she says. “I welcome them all.”
