Had a guy in last week from out of town who was a golf course bankruptcy expert.
"Which golf course?" I asked.
"Can't tell you," he laughed.
I was talking about our crazy Bend boom, and later on in the conversation, he mentioned a golf course...."What were they thinking?" he said. I don't feel like I can say which golf course, because I weedled the information out of the guy without informing him that I might post the info on a blog. It probably doesn't matter -- I think it could be ANY of the golf courses.
And frankly...I think it was misdirection, anyway. He caught his mistake, unless I was reading the conversation wrong. I'm guessing, most likely, he was in town because of Broken Top, which has already been in the paper as a possibility. But I don't know.
Add that little nugget with the news in today's paper that Jeld-Wen is has unloaded or is trying to unload their destination resort properties, and you got to figure all these guys are hurting.
Add that to all the news about new retail "malls", and the constant churn of stores in downtown Bend, and the death-defying moves of CACB and....well, I don't know what to think.
My guess, and it's only a guess, is that we existing businesses are only now feeling the full brunt of the downturn -- that enough time has passed, and enough of a less than encouraging future stretches out before us -- that reality, gravity, is setting in.
But, apparently, for Bend the froth continues -- though if you look at it a little more closely, what do we really have? A couple of empty complexes -- which used to house businesses that created good paying jobs, in exchange for a bunch of retail. One of the complexes -- if you don't mind me saying -- is less a mall than a flea market.
Making lemonade. One 0f the new retailers in the Brightwood complex actually touted the "industrial" feel of the place. Well, I understand that. Make if funky, baby.
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I should probably make it clear, I think these two new retail malls are a positive development.
In fact, it kind of reminds me of the beginnings of the renewal of downtown Bend.
If the rent is cheap enough for the bohemians, than it may spin off into all kinds of new creativity....
Downtown has gotten too expensive for this kind of -- from the ground up -- retail.
I was talking to another downtown business owner who thought that the very expense of downtown gives out the message that if you open in downtown you'll get immediate business -- to their sorrow, often.
I don't think it's secret that the BT Members paid $9M for BT back in 2007. Those on the sideline knew it was crazy. More amazing is they went to court to get the right to buy it! So now Tetherow may pick it up for a small fraction of that original amount. Or maybe they won't cause the destination resort biz has been flat lining for quite some time.
So while Rome burns and the county re-works the destination resort map as if it matters. It won't. Maybe it's time to re-think destination resorts.
Just got back from one of the Jeld Wenn resorts. They had a special where we paid $69 a night for a room that normally rents for $153. Was by far the best $69 hotel room I've ever had -- ever.
Almost felt bad paying so little, and there were few other people taking advatange of their fall blowout special.
The morning after we got there I saw the ad that said that the Jeld Wenn resorts are up for sale.
I wonder if this was your bankruptcy guy.
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