Insights and trends on developing and ongoing Tucson regional business news.

Starwood finally closes deal

Three years after announcing Tucson would be one of the first five locations for a new hotel concept called aloft, Starwood Hotels has finished acquiring the remainder of the property it wanted for the project on the southeast corner of East Speedway and North Campbell Avenue.

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According to records filed Aug. 12 with Pima County, Starwood paid $3.05 million for property it’s acquiring from the Sundt Family Trust and another $370,000 for a slice of frontage from the University of Arizona.

Ultimately, Starwood is looking to replace its seven-story 150-room Four Points by Sheraton Hotel with the new concept it describes as “hip, urban attitude.” But now there’s no timetable for when that might be. 

The current state of the economy is one factor slowing things down, but others include the fact that Starwood wants to keep a Four Points-branded property somewhere in the Tucson market.

Starwood has already opened 19 aloft hotels elsehwere around the world and announced plans to open 73 more by the end of 2011, including four others in Arizona - Chandler, Glendale, Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport and Tempe - that are scheduled to be open by December 2009.

Testing intimate Wal-Marts

Wal-Mart, the company known for its 185,000 square-foot Supercenters, is going the opposite direction in the Phoenix market where it’s testing the concept of a 15,000 square-foot grocery store described as more intimate, more selective and focusing on fresh foods.

The first four stores opened Saturday (Oct. 4) in Chandler, Gilbert, Mesa and Tempe. The stores, which are being beta tested, are named Marketside with the name Wal-Mart nowhere to be found.

The test in Phoenix puts America’s largest retailer up against Great Britan’s largest food store chain, Tesco, which is rolling out a similar concept there called Fresh and Easy.