Sunset Plaza, the collection of retail designer boutiques between San Vicente and La Cienega boulevards, is like no other place in Los Angeles. The row of international shops and restaurants attracts the area’s wealthiest, trend-savvy locals.
It is youth-oriented and ultra-hip, high-end and flashy. In short, it is everything that its owner, Francis S. Montgomery II, is not.
Montgomery, old-school and to the point, decides which retailers make the cut and which don’t. He is president of Montgomery Management, the family business that owns and manages Sunset Plaza. He has lived in a home perched in the Hollywood Hills just above this tony strip of West Hollywood for most of his life.
Sunset Plaza has been in the Montgomery family since 1892, when Montgomery’s great-grandfather, Victor Ponet, purchased what was then 230 open acres of land. It was developed in the mid-1920s by Ponet’s son-in law, Francis S. Montgomery.
While most of L.A’s retail districts have gone in and out of vogue over the years, or have died out altogether, the Montgomery family has managed to keep Sunset Plaza as a destination of chic allure for more than 70 years.
Question: Sunset Plaza attracts a very hip crowd. You, on the other hand, appear very conservative not the earring-sporting type. How do you successfully run a project whose tenants and customers are so different from yourself?
Answer: I pay attention to what people are doing. I have a lot of merchant friends who keep me plugged into what people like. I do a lot of traveling around. I go to New York and go to the retail areas, Madison Avenue, SoHo. I was in London in June; I visited a lot of stores there. I go to Paris, Vienna.
Q: Your uncle, Francis J. Montgomery, was president prior to you. When and why did you step in as president?
A: My father, George F. Montgomery and uncle Francis J. Montgomery were the energy behind the company. My father died in 1986. I became president about eight years ago. No big deal. Nothing has really changed. We have always done the same work. My uncle and I just shifted titles. He still comes in every day, but he does mostly personal work.
Q: Are your two sons in the family business?
A: No. One is an attorney in San Francisco and another is a home developer in Orange County.
Q: Who will take over the business when you retire?
A: Somebody will be around. There’s various family members floating around.
Q: Historically, family-run businesses have deteriorated or collapsed as successive generations have inherited them. Has there ever been a time that your family considered selling Sunset Plaza?
A: No, because the problem of reinvesting was too overwhelming. It’s as simple as that. You have to take your money, go home and pay a tax, and then try to reinvest it. Then what would you buy? I don’t know.
Q: Does your family shop at Sunset Plaza?
A: Sure. I would hope they would come here first. I buy gifts here and we eat here all the time.
Q: Unlike Rodeo Drive’s Fred Hayman, who is highly visible, you’ve kept a relatively low profile more behind the scenes. Is that intentional?
A: I’m not behind the scenes. I’m in the front ranks here. Hey, I’m out there. I’m out there pitching (Sunset Plaza) all the time.
Q: Do you follow a certain management philosophy?
A: That’s a tough question. I would say it’s day by day. I really couldn’t articulate it. For instance, I had a tenant that was here for about 15 years. We moved her into a smaller store, but all of a sudden her business was doing very poorly and we said to her, “If you’re uncomfortable here, we’ll let you out of the lease. You’ve been here a long time, take a walk if you want to.” So we let her out of the lease.
Q: Yet most of your tenants seem to stay here a long time, once they move in. Why is that?
A: It’s pride of ownership to a great extent. We want Sunset Plaza to look perfect, rather than milking the property. It goes right back to what my uncle used to say a lot, “This is our front yard.” We all grew up around here.
Q: Sunset Plaza is not like Third Street Promenade or Old Town Pasadena, with the more homogenous national retail chain stores. Why is that?
A: We won’t permit those stores in here. Because they’re just what you said, homogenous. We try to take owner-operated boutiques with specialized luxury items. That’s the way it’s always been from the very beginning whether it was George Harel who had a photography studio in the 1930s or Don Loper, the famous designer. We used to have a lot of antique stores and decorator services. Elizabeth Arden started here, where the Coffee Bean is now, and Tracey Ross.
Q: Sunset Plaza is not as well known as other touristy areas like Rodeo Drive and Melrose Avenue. Is this intentional?
A: No, not really. We spend $15,000 a year in the Guest Informant that is in all the hotel rooms. We have these ads; to us it’s a little corny, but it’s the only way to reach the target person who is perhaps from places like Germany and Tokyo.
Q: Many if not all of your retail tenants deal in high-end merchandise and services. What prompted you to allow Chin Chin, a relatively inexpensive cafe, to join the upscale mix?
A: It was a risk on our part. Next to it was an antique store. It was a little sleepy. Really, Chin Chin brought a lot of fun and vitality here. As a result, we encouraged the sidewalk cafe concept. Since that time we’ve promoted that kind of restaurant seating to put people out on the street. To attract moths to the flame, as it were. People drive by and see all these people and say, “Well, something’s going on there.”
We have a lot of people wanting to open restaurants here. But we’re not looking for anyone.
Q: What types of retailers do you forbid?
A: No startups. No food, no denim or Jamba Juice. There are a lot of cigar stores around, it would be fun. I smoke cigars, but that would be a waste of time for us. It goes against the Sunset Plaza customer. Our customer is healthy.
There are some retailers who I speak to who are full of ideas, energy and capital. We talk back and forth and finally, we just say, in a sense, “Get some more miles on you and come back and let’s talk again.”
Q: What about during the recession, when you weren’t 100 percent leased. How did you avoid ending up with a lot of vacant stores?
A: We immediately lowered the rents. It’s very simple. We never want it empty. We’ll do anything to make the tenant succeed. It’s like extending a life raft to them. If they have to tough it out for a while, then we have to tough it out.
Q: What kind of consumer does Sunset Plaza wish to attract?
A: Los Angeles magazine had said something about where to find single women making $90,000 a year. The answer was Sunset Plaza. So we were pleased, because that would be a target consumer female executives, career women. We make it comfortable here. Unlimited free parking. She could spend a day and a night and then go home.
Q: Any recent or future development going on at Sunset Plaza?
A: We finished about five years ago a major apartment building right next door to us on 1211 Sunset Plaza Drive, with 55 units, 110 parking spaces. We have some empty lots here across Sunset Boulevard; we have an empty lot where we could put 40 apartment units. On Holloway we have zoning for about 250 units. Eventually it’s going to get built. We take the long view. We have a lot across the street for a commercial building. We’re just starting to do some sketches on that. We’re already having some thoughts on what it should look like.
