A planned 250,000-square-foot retail development at the intersection of Highway 78 and Goodman Road will usher in some new retailers to the Olive Branch area.

Memphis-based Weston Cos. is developing the retail regional center in conjunction with John Hyneman Cos. of Germantown. John Hyneman owns the 39 acres on the northeast corner of the intersection where the retail projects will be developed.

Weston is handling about 400 acres of commercial real estate Hyneman owns in North Mississippi.

The land in Olive Branch is adjacent to the Wal-Mart Supercenter, and Hyneman is developing the regional shopping center to take advantage of the drawing power of that popular retailer, says Steve Brommer, vice president of retail leasing for Weston.

“It’s a big piece of land, so what we had to do is to master plan it and come up with a design that makes sense,” Brommer says. “That land really lends itself to a large center.”

Goodman Road, which connects Horn Lake, Southaven and Olive Branch, has become the dominant retail, office and commercial artery in North Mississippi, Brommer says. And Olive Branch, with its proximity to Germantown, is poised to grow commercially.

Brommer says being close to Germantown Extended (Riverdale) and Hacks Cross makes any retail easily accessible to shoppers in southeast Shelby County.

“I think the reality of it is that Olive Branch is going to be seeing the same growth Southaven did over the last five years,” Brommer says. “Olive Branch is on the way to doing the same thing. Olive Branch will be the next Southaven.”

And that intersection of Highway 78 and Goodman Road will be the hub of Olive Branch.

“It’s the commercial center of Olive Branch, and it will be for the next several years,” Hyneman says. “For years Olive Branch was more of an industrial area, but the rooftops are driving the commercial growth.”

Brommer says the Hyneman project will consist of several buildings, including a 100,000-square-foot facility that could house a single national retailer. He says Weston is talking to several large retailers about the development.

The project will have frontage along a new four-lane road, Camp Creek Road, that was recently completed through Hyneman’s land. Camp Creek Road intersects with Craft Goodman Road, an access road that gives consumers access to the Wal-Mart from Highway 78 and Goodman. And the Hyneman development also will have good visibility from Goodman Road.

The 39 acres is part of 51 acres originally Hyneman owned. In June, Weston sold 12 acres to Camp Creek Center LLC, a group of local investors that has hired Weston to design and build an unanchored, 32,000-square-foot L-shaped shopping center called Camp Creek Center. Trammell Crow Co. has been given leasing rights on the property.

There will be four outparcels, totaling 20,500 square feet, near Camp Creek shopping center available for development as well. The buildings will range in size from 3,000 to 8,000 square feet.

Brommer says plans for that center are complete and site work is underway for Camp Creek. That center could house between 10 and 15 tenants.

A representative with Camp Creek says possible users include a women’s fashion store, a shoe store and a deli/sub shop, which is the typical portfolio of shadow retailers. The outparcels will most likely be occupied by restaurants and bank users.

That intersection of Highway 78 and Goodman Road is no stranger to retail development. In addition to the Wal-Mart Supercenter, the intersection is home to a Kroger-anchored shopping center as well as an Applebee’s, Taco Bell and other banks and small office users.

And another development immediately adjacent to the north of Wal-Mart, along Highway 78, is in the works pending the purchase of 17 acres by another developer, says Danny Buring of The Shopping Center Group of Tennessee. Buring is representing the buyer, who is negotiating to buy the land from Wal-Mart.

Buring says the 17 acres could be the site of 70,000 square feet of retail space and would be the first phase of a project that could eventually total nearly 40 acres and include 250,000 square feet of retail space.

“We’re about to close on the first phase, the 17 acres, and we’re holding off on developing the first phase until we can see where some of the big boxes want to land because that impacts how we want to develop our piece and phase 2 specifically,” Buring says.

Buring calls that intersection in Olive Branch “the convergence of all the things that are right about a growing trade area.”

“We just knew it was going to be a intersection that was going to be successful, and I’ve been chasing it ever since.”

CONTACT staff writer Tara Milligan at 259-1728 or tmilligan@bizjournals.com

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