Community diversity is the developer's challenge

Developers find new ways to make communities stand apart
The Tennessean• May 25, 2008

There aren't any homes yet in the Cartwright Close development off Berry's Chapel Road. In fact, there aren't even streets there yet.
But the undeveloped site already has hosted an old-fashioned barbecue supper complete with gingham tablecloths, Mason jars for sweet tea and hay bales decorated with old-fashioned quilts.
Developers with The Principals Group were willing to truck baked beans and barbecue up the steep hillside during the May 14 shindig in order to let potential buyers gaze upon the pristine hills while they grazed on corn on the cob.
It's all designed to build early buzz for the future 144-acre community, where a few of the 22 total home sites cost more than $1 million.
For Richard Johnson, a partner with the Brentwood-based developer, the spend-money-to-make-money approach is simply the norm. After all, a modest barbecue is small potatoes to the firm that threw a $40,000 party to introduce the Cool Springs neighborhood Avalon in 2003.
"It's an approach to advertising and marketing — more of a philosophy than anything else," he said.
More and more developers seem to be picking up on his approach. As subdivisions continue to sprout in Williamson County, developers are getting increasingly aggressive — and creative — in marketing their communities.
Some have opened storefronts on Main Street, where they sell the concept of their communities. Others wine and dine potential buyers at lavish parties. Some just launch a guy from a cannon.
The goal is simple: kick things off with a bang (sometimes literally) and set apart the community from myriad others across the county and region.
Movie launches McEwen"You can't con today's homebuyer," said Jim Cheney, a spokesman for developer Southern Land Co. "You've got to be on top of your game. You've got to be speaking genuinely and showing you've put the time and energy and thought into what you're going to offer them."
Earlier this year, Southern Land Co. produced a 17-minute documentary about the making of McEwen, the upcoming mixed-use development off McEwen Drive that aims to combine retail, office and residential space in a pedestrian-friendly environment.
Southern Land executives premiered McEwen: The Movie for more than 600 real estate agents, developers, city officials and potential homebuyers at Carmike Thoroughbred 20 in Cool Springs.
"Never in my 30 years of being a Realtor have I been to a function like this," said Donna Tisdale, a broker with Worth Properties in Nashville, at the film's premiere.
In the lobby of the movie theater, developers unveiled a large-scale 3-D model of McEwen that was displayed for several months so passersby and moviegoers could get a glimpse of the mixed-use development that will soon emerge behind the theater.
"You have to show them that you mean something different," Cheney said. "That's why we see the value in going that far over the top in presenting this to professionals and the public. If they've forgotten about this by tomorrow morning, we haven't done our job."
Southern Land Co. is no stranger to going over the top. Around this time last year, the company was launching the mixed-use Town Center section of Westhaven off Highway 96 West by launching David "The Cannonball" Smith out of a cannon.
Accessibility countsOther developers are counting on longer-term exposure by opening storefronts in well-trafficked pedestrian areas. On Franklin's Main Street, for instance, companies such as Deer Creek Construction and developers of the mixed-use project Jamison Station have opened storefronts meant to stop shoppers in between boutiques.
It's part of a move away from traditional on-site sales centers, where house hunters have to find their way to the under-construction neighborhood. The new concept allows out-of-towners or passersby to stumble upon sales centers amid other errands, said Crystal Brown, sales director for Jamison Station.
Jamison Station's storefront plays a documentary in its display window and uses outdoor audio to attract people as they're walking by.
"Everyone has seen the typical trailer on site or the first model home," Brown said. "Nowadays you do have to find ways to appeal to your target buyer by going outside the box."
Nearly 75 percent of Jamison Station's sales have come from people who have wandered into the storefront off the street, Brown estimates. Jamison Station will maintain its storefront for two to three more years — until the development is finished with all its phases.
"You might get walk-by traffic that has never even heard of Jamison Station, but they'll walk in the door and say, 'What is this place?' " Brown said.
Parties always popularWhile sales centers may be getting savvier, upscale parties will likely always be a popular way to sell new communities.
Days before developers broke ground last spring on the College Grove golf course community Laurel Cove, hundreds of prospective buyers and real estate agents packed a hall in The Factory at Franklin for live entertainment, dancing, celebrity appearances, and food and drinks.
For The Principals Group's infamous Avalon fete, invitations were hand-delivered by folks in medieval costumes, speaking in Old World vernacular.
The event itself included roasted pig and giant turkey legs, jugglers, wenches, knights on horseback and about $3,000 worth of fireworks.
"I don't know how we could have made it more grand than it was," Johnson said. "For weeks I was getting calls saying, 'That was the grandest event I've ever been to.' And that was our objective."
The party was responsible for about $18 million in sales, Johnson estimates.
"The most money that is spent on advertising every year is done on the Super Bowl. The best commercials are the ones that entertain," Johnson said. "A lot of people have told me, 'You can't do that kind of stuff with my clients — these are executives.' But executives love to laugh just like us."
Trend isn't newThe over-the-top trend isn't isolated to Williamson County, but may be thriving because there's more competition here, said Joe Horne, the county's community development director.
"What all these probably have in common is that these are not your father's subdivisions," Horne said. "These are pretty expensive developments, so the payoff on the back end would seem to indicate you can spend much more money on the front end rather than putting up a 'coming soon' sign."
It's also a trend based on the county's ever-changing development fabric, he said.
"This has been happening nationally for quite a while," Horne said. "As this market is becoming more national, you'll start seeing more techniques. What we think are new are just new here."
Developers might be responding to the sluggish housing market, Horne said, but that theory doesn't always hold up, given that the builder's bashes have come during both economic highs and lows.
"We've done this for 20 years," Johnson said. "It has nothing to do with where the market is right now."
Developers say they will continue finding ways to outdo one another, although lavish marketing ploys don't always spell success. Johnson remembers the most expensive invitation he ever created for an event, at $75 apiece. It fell flat, and developers netted no money from the event.
"You don't win every time," Johnson said. "But the key has always been to make it fun."