BACKGROUND:
Economic Development strategy is grounded on understanding your community and how your consumers and businesses fit into the broader region. Historically, consumer data was limited to decennial census data. Over time, more Census Bureau data became available (e.g., American Community Survey, Current Population Survey, and Survey of Business Owners). These data sources, while valuable, are time consuming to access and manipulate. These data sources, taken individually, are limited in their ability to provide insight into commercial activity and user trends. Universities have created entire degree programs focused on mining, manipulating, and displaying data.
Historically, consumer product companies relied on voluntarily-completed consumer surveys and focus groups to learn more about consumer preferences. Questionable at best, these surveys provided at least some insight into consumers’ buying capacity and behavior. With the advent of smart phone tracking technology in the late 2000’s, companies began to access real-time down-to-the-minute smart phone user location data. Companies were no longer reliant on consumers reporting what they believed was their behavior. Instead, companies can now access data that reports on consumers’ actual behavior.
As technology improved, companies like Placer AI have married mobile data location data with Census (and other data sources) to provide a more robust picture of consumer profiles. These different data sets include information on annual income, educational attainment, disposable income, and ethnicity. Once mapped, a remarkably accurate picture of consumer behavior, consumer profiles, and spending capacities emerges.
DISCUSSION:
The Placer data is being used to both attract new businesses and analyze/reposition underperforming assets. The following are examples of Placer data use:
Scenario #1: An ethnic-focused grocery store chain
The Economic Development Department (EDD) has been pursuing a popular ethnic- focused grocery store chain for three years. Because of ongoing land negotiations, the grocery chain has requested their name be kept confidential. For this presentation, this grocery chain will be called O’Malley’s.
When initially working to attract O’Malley’s, EDD used consumer analytic data to demonstrate how Cathedral City met their initial site selection criteria. This data demonstrated Cathedral City generally had many potential O’Malley’s customers based on ethnicity, age, and income.
When O’Malley’s was ready to take a more in depth look at various potential sites in the western Coachella Valley, EDD used Placer data to evaluate potential Cathedral City locations. The attached report is an example of one of the locations analyzed for O’Malley’s. The OMalleys Supermarket NWC Vista Chino and Landau report compares a theoretical location (Vista Chino and Landau) to consumer and location data from the top 25% of O’Malley’s 50+ other stores. The Vista Chino and Landau location was selected as a possible location for illustration purposes only. Reports were run on other viable locations within the City. O’Malley’s is interested in one of the other viable locations analyzed and is currently in discussions with the listing broker on that property. O’Malley’s has requested all location details be kept confidential. For this reason, EDD is including this sample location report on the Vista Chino and Landau site (instead of the actual site O’Malley’s is pursuing) to illustrate the site-specific information Placer AI provides.
Placer analyzes and creates graphs on the following data points:
a) Demographic fit
b) Cannibalization
c) Frequency of co-tenants
d) Average consumer monthly visits
e) Typical building size
f) Nearest competitive location
g) Household income
h) Education levels
i) Ethnicity
j) House values
k) Age
l) Households
m) Marital status
The high degree of comparability between O’Malley’s top performing stores and the proposed Cathedral City site validates EDD’s recommendations to O’Malley’s owners and real estate broker to acquire and build within Cathedral City.
Scenario #2: Sales Leakage
All city residents have buying needs (shoes, cars, and clothing) and preferences (hot prepared food, antiques, and alcohol). Sales tax is generated from the consumption of these goods. Cities increase sales tax revenues by strategically attracting businesses which sell these high-value (or high volume) taxable goods.
Sales leakage occurs when residents of one city travel to a different city to purchase taxable goods. Sales tax revenue which could have gone to support municipal services within the home city is leaked into the economies of neighboring cities.
The following Placer report summarizes the top 20 most frequented shopping centers (or businesses) by Cathedral City residents over the last year. The complete list ranks 1,442 locations Cathedral City residents have visited between 990,305 times (Destination Ramon) to 44 times (Express Cleaners in La Quinta) over the last 12 months. Understanding which businesses Cathedral City residents routinely visit (and presumably purchase from) lets EDD know which types of businesses are not in Cathedral City and which businesses EDD should work on attracting. Additionally, having sales leakage data in hand allows EDD to provide data to the potential businesses to demonstrate Cathedral City resident demand for their respective products or services. This demand data also helps inform EDD on what businesses may be not be viable if attracted into Cathedral City.
Leakage Entity Name Leakage Entity
Address
Leakage
Group
Category
Leakage
Primary
Category
Leakage
Sub
Category
Visits By
Residents
Destination Ramon 5601 Ramon Rd,
Palm Springs, CA,
United States
Shopping
Centers
Community
Shopping
Centers
Shopping
Center
990,305
Desert Gateway 34380 Monterey
Ave, Palm Desert,
CA, United States
Shopping
Centers
Community
Shopping
Centers
Shopping
Center
717,180
Walmart 5601 E Ramon Rd,
Palm Springs
Superstores Superstores Big Box
Store 715,772
Monterey Shore
Plaza
72800 Dinah Shore
Dr, Palm Desert,
CA, United States
Shopping
Centers
Community
Shopping
Centers
Shopping
Center
388,839
EoS Fitness 4070 Airport
Center Drive, Palm
Springs
Fitness Fitness Gym /
Fitness
Center 325,586
Monterey
Marketplace
34249 Monterey
Ave, Rancho
Mirage, CA, United
States
Shopping
Centers
Community
Shopping
Centers
Shopping
Center
317,656
Costco Wholesale 72800 Dinah Shore
Dr, Palm Desert
Superstores Superstores Warehouse
Store 290,842
Walmart 34500 Monterey
Ave, Palm Desert
Superstores Superstores Big Box
Store 247,443
Sam's Club 34220 Monterey
Ave, Palm Desert
Superstores Superstores Warehouse
Store 246,691
In-N-Out Burger 72265 Varner Rd,
Thousand Palms
Dining Fast Food &
QSR
Burger
Joint 215,864
Rancho Las Palmas 42520 Bob Hope
Dr, Rancho
Mirage, CA, United
States
Shopping
Centers
Community
Shopping
Centers
Shopping
Center
208,055
Smoke Tree
Commons
2465 East Palm
Canyon Road,
Palm Springs, CA,
United States
Shopping
Centers
Community
Shopping
Centers
Shopping
Center
197,238
Gene Autry Plaza 5001 Ramon Rd,
Palm Springs, CA,
United States
Shopping
Centers
Community
Shopping
Centers
Shopping
Center
166,480
Monterey Crossing SEC Monterey Ave. Shopping Community Shopping 160,291 I-10, Palm Desert,
CA, United States
Centers Shopping
Centers
Center
Agua Caliente Resort
Casino Spa Rancho
Mirage
32-250 Bob Hope
Dr, Rancho Mirage
Hotels &
Casinos
Hotels &
Casinos
Hotel
129,498
Raising Cane's
Chicken Fingers
5601 Ramon Rd,
Palm Springs
Dining Fast Food &
QSR
Fried
Chicken
Joint 120,655
One Eleven Town
Center
44459 Town
Center Way, Palm
Desert, CA, United
States
Shopping
Centers
Community
Shopping
Centers
Shopping
Center
114,630
Lowe's 5201 E Ramon Rd,
Palm Springs
Home
Improvement
Home
Improvement
Hardware
Store 107,044
Chick-fil-A 73070 Dinah Shore
Dr, Palm Desert
Dining Fast Food &
QSR
Fast Food
Restaurant 106,876
In-N-Out Burger 42560 Bob Hope
Dr, Rancho Mirage
Dining Fast Food &
QSR
Burger
Joint 105,152
Target 72549 Highway
111, Palm Desert
Superstores Superstores Big Box
Store 98,376
Scenario #3: Repositioning a high-potential yet underperforming asset.
Placer data can be used to compare one shopping destination with other shopping destinations. This comparison can shed light on similarities between respective resident populations, number of visits, demographics, and potentially identify potential tenant combinations which may help increase sales traffic to the subject site.
The attached example suggests the Golden Mile shopping center has the potential for significant customer traffic growth given the highly comparable customer profile Golden Mile, Cathedral City shares with the Jackson Street, Indio retail center. The question EDD looks to solve is what different tenant mix would attract more customers to Golden Mile than what currently shops at Golden Mile.
Examples of these comparisons and customer location reports (listed below and attached) include:
1) 2023-09-30 Market Landscape - Golden Mile Center - Oct 1, 2022 - Sep 30, 2023
2) 2023-09-30 Market Landscape - Jackson Street Retail Center, Indio CA - Oct 1, 2022 - Sep 30, 2023
3) 2023-09-30 Property Overview - Golden Mile Center, Jackson Street Retail Center, Indio CA - Apr 1, 2023 - Sep 30, 2023
The above are just some examples of Placer data usage. EDD is continually looking for new ways to leverage consumer data to better inform business attraction, retention, and expansion decisions.
FISCAL IMPACT:
No fiscal impact.
FIVE-YEAR STRATEGIC PLAN:
Action C-8: Strengthen the Economic Development Team.
Action C-15: Develop Economic Development Strategic Plan which addresses economic development opportunities, business attraction, retention, and expansion including the attraction and support of trade sector training and employment. Key focus of this plan will include a viable strategy to develop areas north of I-10 including the North Area Specific Plan, Extended North Area Specific Plan, and potential Thousand Palms annexation.