BRAND ATLANTIC SELECTED AS BUSINESS OF THE MONTH BY ESPN AND BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT BOARD
March 21, 2023
Brand Atlantic is bringing two great projects to the downtown West Palm Beach area. One is at 111 Olive and the other is at 300 Banyan.
Featured on “ESPN West Palm Tonight”:
Andrew Dance
Managing Partner
Brand Atlantic Real Estate Partners
Tell me about your firm, Brand Atlantic:
Brand Atlantic is a real estate development and investment company that I started two years ago. I had been working at a real estate firm in New York for a long time and took the opportunity that South Florida presented. In my business, I really want to be where the market is and today, you can unequivocally say that it’s South Florida, then everywhere else.
Tell us a little about these awesome projects that Brand Atlantic is bringing to downtown West Palm Beach:
We are well underway with two boutique office developments in downtown West Palm that will be really incredible additions to the community.
The first project is called 111 Olive, which is located at the intersection of Clematis and Olive in downtown West Palm Beach. It’s a complete renovation and reimagination of a three-story building that was originally designed in the 1930s by a famous architect named John Volk. Our team has done an amazing job preserving and showcasing some of the building’s original features, but at the same time we’ve introduced a sleek and contemporary aesthetic with luxury amenities and modern floor plans that’s resulted in a very cool and beautiful building. Construction should wrap up in the next couple of months and hope to have some office and retail open and moving in by the fall.
Our second project is 300 Banyan, which is the construction of a 12-story office tower located next door to 111 Olive. The construction is currently six stories out of the ground and will be finished about a year from now. It’s going to be a great addition to the skyline and the community.
On your website, brandatlantic.com, it says, “Right City + Right Submarket + Best Property”. How do the 111 Olive and 300 Banyan projects fit in that framework?
I think that people’s preferences for how and where they spend their time has been changing over that last 10 years and the pandemic gave us a unique opportunity to actually make choices about where we want to live and work. People want to be where the action is where they can easily walk around the neighborhood as an extension of our work environment, whether it’s to get coffee or take a call outside. I think that’s what Clematis waterfront really does a great job at with the beautiful waterfront, walkable streets and busy storefronts. I come from New York City where you have very tall towers and I think the unique architecture of Clematis, of it not being so big, but approachable, feels very human and engaging.
Tell us about some of the retail spaces that will be involved in these projects:
We have about 20,000 square feet of ground floor retail where we’ll be welcoming Pubbelly Sushi to a space this fall and a signature restaurant space that’s pretty unique where it bridges across the laneway that runs between the two buildings. Everyone wants to be outside, but they want to be in the shade.
What we’ve done is created a big garden room for this restaurant and we’ve had a really great reaction from prospects from around the country. It will be along Olive Street with an indoor portion and an outdoor covered portion of the restaurant. We expect to have a great announcement in the coming months.
We also have a walk-up bistro café as part of the 300 Banyan building that’s really designed to be the breakfast and lunch place to stop by and sit to have your coffee or avocado toast. I think just broadly speaking to the retail, there is a tremendous amount of interest in the Clematis district from top retailers and restaurant groups from around the country. It feels like a foregoing conclusion that the next generation of Clematis Street, which probably started a couple of years ago, will be about upscale, fun restaurants, cafes and nightlife. It will still keep the DNA of Clematis Street, but adjust to the new customers.
Why did you choose Pubbelly as one of the restaurants you wanted to be involved with this project?
Pubbelly is originally from South Beach, Miami and we’re bringing healthy, casual lunch and dinner options that are more upscale. We had a lot of interest for the space and Pubbelly fit the niche pretty well.
Do you have insights on the types of businesses you’re seeing come to and arrive in the West Palm Beach market?
During 2020 and the pandemic, you saw a lot of owners of investment management firms, hedge funds or private equity firms moving down to South Florida.
I’d describe this next wave as way more deliberate. There’s a lot more planning to understand what the needs of the firm are. It’s not a back-office type user – it’s truly producing offices for the demand of employees and talent wanting to be down here. That’s really what the companies are doing. It’s typically an expansion of firms coming from the Northeast, Chicago and L.A. where they’re looking to have a new outpost to meet the demands of their employees who want to be down here. The name of the game for our prospective tenants is talent attraction and talent retention. To get the top talent, they need to have their demand for office space met in South Florida.
How will your properties at 111 Olive and 300 Banyan stand out from other properties in the area?
There’s a big landlord which is Related and they’re doing a great job with their existing assets as well as plans for new ones. Where I see the differentiation of segmentation is we’re offering more of a boutique size. 300 Banyan has 115,000 sq. ft. of office space, which is at most a third of what Related has and is planning. We’re not going to be for everybody, but I think we do have a point of differentiation in being boutique.
I’m curious to know about your relationship with the Business Development Board of Palm Beach County and how they’ve been helpful with Brand Atlantic’s entrance in the West Palm Beach market.
It was probably one of our first stops when we were evaluating closing on the property and taking the step to go start this company. To have a resource like that, which brings both energy and a sincere desire for things to work out, my first impression was that they take this very seriously. You can feel that they’ve been at it for a long time. The whole organization is an incredible resource.
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