Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Virgin Megastore Times Square Closing in April

via. Hip Hop Update.

Damn. This thing is kind of iconic in a sense. This is where ALL artists would come to promote their albums after they made the rounds at MTV.

Via Billboard:

The Times Square Virgin Megastore, which is the highest volume music store in the U.S., will shut down come April.

The store has been at the center of speculation since August 2007 when the Virgin Entertainment Group North America was acquired by two real estate companies - the Related Cos. and Vornado - in a joint venture.

Last June, a Vornado executive told Reuters that the store would shut down in the first quarter of 2009. The decision to close the store appears related to real estate and the value connected to the location. That executive was quoted as saying that Virgin pays only $54 per square-foot when the market rent in the area is about $700 a square foot.

So, while the store, which does an estimated $55 million in annual volume, is profitable to the tune of $6 million, according to sources, the space would be even more profitable for its owner with a higher rent tenant. Vornado bought the 180,000 square foot retail component of the Bertelsmann building, which houses the Times Square store, in 2006, and will lease the space to Forever 21, according to press reports.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Look what downloading music has done to this place. It's crazy. The largest selling record store in the country is shutting down. That's insane to me for some reason.

What do you think of this?

http://www.rapbasement.com/audio/kid-cudi-ft.-jermaine-dupri-day-n-nite-remix.html

Kev - S.L.A.B. ENT. said...

ehhh... its whatever.

everybody in the music industry is a bunch of followers with a FEW leaders. JDs about 6 months too late