ShopRite Operator Buys Del. Shopping Center
Bernie Kenny, president of FSSC LLC in Hockessin, Del., has purchased the First State Plaza shopping center in Stanton, Del., from USRP I LLC, an entity controlled by Jacksonville, Fla.-based Regency Shopping Centers of Jacksonville, Florida. Kenny is also the chairman and founder of Delaware Supermarkets Inc. (DSI), a company operating five ShopRite supermarkets in the state, including one anchoring the 164, 779-square-foot shopping center.
Other major retailers in the center include a 10-screen Cinemark movie theater, Dollar Tree, and the U.S. Post Office.
“We know First State Plaza, having operated the supermarket in the shopping center for the last 25 years,” noted Kenny, adding that his company would now update the center’s “look and … tenant mix, and [make] First State Plaza an even more important community hub.”
The new owner also plans to expedite the installation of a bus shelter to facilitate Dart, the transit services provided by the Delaware Authority for Regional Transit, making the center easily accessible by mass transit, and to construct an additional exit from the center to reduce traffic congestion in the parking lot while allowing easy access to Route 4.
“Giving the community greater access to our store and to the shopping center through improved public transit will make the center an even greater source of pride to all those who live and work in the area,” said DSI CEO Chris Kenny.
According to Jeff Dunne of CBRE’s New York Institutional Group, who represented the seller: “First State Plaza was a strategic investment for the Kenny family, providing them with control over ShopRite’s future and additional leasing to be completed at the center. Having a landlord who also operates an anchor store in the shopping center is typically a winning combination for a successful shopping center.”
ShopRite is the registered trademark of Keasbey, N.J.-based retail cooperative Wakefern Food Corp., whose members operate stores under the ShopRite banner across the Northeast.