A parade of lead balloons.

• Author: Rundles, Jeff
• Position: Rundles Wrap-up

AS I LOOK BACK ON A LONG TIME OF SCRIBBLING like this, it occurs to me that among my many interests is retail, and more specifically retail development.

When I saw a newspaper headline about a month ago concerning the merger of retail giants Federated Department Stores and May Department Stores, it brought back some interesting memories. The headline read: "Takeover means Foley's stores likely to become Macy's."

It all reminded me that some 15 years ago the business establishment in Denver would have given away the farm--and nearly did--for a headline like that.

Back in the depths of the Denver economic downturn in the late 1980s, any chamber-of-commerce type around would tell you--would preach to you--that the way to revive the Denver economy, particularly the economy of Downtown Denver, would be to entice big retail names to open up here. The major player they most often hit on was Macy's.

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To convince Macy's that Denver was a first-rate city for retail development, the city and the various business-booster organizations threw a mini Macy's Parade, complete with a few recognizable cartoon-character balloons, in the vicinity of Arapahoe and the 16th Street Mall. There were speeches and a lot of smooching of Macy's figurative backsides.

But, of course, the deal never went down.

For Macy's, the Denver parade was something of a trial balloon, a showy way for them to come out here and see what kind of incentive package we were willing to throw at them. The package, as usual, was a substantial mix of tax abatements and land and development subsidies, but in the end it couldn't deliver the one incentive that ultimately mattered: shoppers.

That's because the prevailing chamber-of-commerce theory at the time was that shoppers would follow retail. But it has always been the opposite. It never was the kind of retail that mattered; it was, and is, always people.

Oddly enough, the economy of Downtown Denver did subsequently revive, and its development and economic sustainability, I would argue, has been based on the creation of housing there. Downtown Denver has become a people place.

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This brings me to the present day, and retail development. Generally referred to as a "lifestyle center,"...