TULSA, Okla. — The long-awaited outlet mall is expected to be 330,000 square feet with 80 premium retail stores.
Construction resuming – after the COVID-19 pandemic and supply chain shortages – was welcome news to customers and businesses alike at the Riverwalk Crossing.
Connie Delauter is the general manager of Los Cabos Mexican Grill and Cantina on the Riverwalk.
She doesn’t think the new outlet mall will hurt her business.
“I have no fear at all,” Delauter said, “The more, the merrier. You know, we’re willing to share our business, but we have such a great clientele, we’re blessed to have them.”
Bryan Mylan was having lunch with his colleagues at Bramble Breakfast and Bar.
“That outlet mall -- if it’s bringing in thousands of people a day, they’re not going to be able to feed everybody in those couple of restaurants so I think it will help this area, as far as restaurant community goes,” he said.
Mylan says it will bring more foot traffic to all of the local small businesses.
It will also bring more tax dollars to the city for infrastructure projects.
Jenks Mayor Corey Box says the outlet mall will be a destination.
“We believe this will be the premiere shopping in the whole state of Oklahoma so we’re expecting this to be not just a benefit to the city of Jenks but this will benefit all of Tulsa county,” he says, “We have people - I talk to often...people who take shopping trips to go down to Dallas or go into Kansas City but we expect people will want to come into Tulsa county now, come into Jenks and shop here.”
Some of the local businesses in downtown Jenks say the new outlet retail stores will only make them more prosperous.
Kevin Smith and his wife Amy own Maggie’s Venue and Pub in downtown Jenks.
“I think there will be more traffic for everybody,” Smith says, “We have a saying that people go where people go and a lot of people don’t understand that it takes more, you know, to bring more people to the community so the more, the merrier. You know, we need more nightlife in Jenks. We need more shops in Jenks that will draw more people so I think the outlet mall’s going to be a great asset.”
Box says the outlet mall will draw shoppers from around the state, but, he says, with inflation and supply chain shortages, there is one thing about the mall that concerns him.
“Are we getting the same exact dimensions? Are we getting the same 330,000 square feet? Are we getting the same quality that we were, you know, five years ago that we expected because of this inabilty to find hardware, to find vendors, to find subcontractors but we fully expect Simon’s to build a word-class facility,” Box says.
The new sign at the construction site says the projected opening of the outlet mall is 2024 but Box says he doesn’t have a precise date.
That is still a lot sooner than when construction halted for 3 years.