Maintain the Vision

Maintain the Vision

At 91, Nathan Benderson, the founder and visionary behind Benderson Development Co., still maintains the same business mantra he devised when we was 16 years old.

For longtime developer Nathan Benderson, good business often comes down to simple arithmetic - and a lot of common sense.

"Before you buy anything, you have to make a synopsis of what you are going to do with it," says Benderson, who founded Benderson Development in Buffalo, N.Y., as a young entrepreneur. "A lot of people go broke, can't pay their bills and can't succeed because (they don't do that)."

That philosophy is how Benderson did business at 16, when he landed a deal to buy 1.8 million used bottles to resell at a profit. And that's how he does business now at 91.

He hunts for opportunity. He envisions the possibilities. And he doesn't relent until those dreams come true.

"My vision is what we can do with (the property) and how we can development them and hope they can succeed," Benderson says. "Up to this point, over the years, our family has been very successful in accomplishing what we saw in these properties."

The current economic conditions in Florida have put Benderson's company in a holding pattern concerning one of its largest projects to date - University Town Center in Sarasota. The mega mall project includes more than 1.6 million square feet of shopping destination, office buildings and hotel space and more than 1,750 residential units to a 246-acre swath of land at the southwest intersection of University Parkway and Interstate 75.

In mid-December, Benderson Development announced it would delay construction of the mall, which was slated to start that month. An opening scheduled for November of 2010 will be delayed.

"I'm really disappointed," Benderson says. "Right now, we're in a recession, and we feel we have to be very careful. I personally think that it's going to take quite a while - not months, several years or more - before (the economy) can recover. We want (the mall) just as badly as (the people) do."

Family business

From the time Benderson made his first significant real estate purchase in 1950 to now, he has built a legacy within his industry. In the 1990s, the company ranked as one of the top 20 builders in the United States and today is considered the largest privately owned real estate development company in the country.

"As people become successful over the years, a lot of them build monuments to themselves or for themselves," Benderson says. "When they start doing that, they invest more than what they really should invest."

With that mindset Benderson has managed to keep a remarkably low profile considering the company's size and scope. Although the company owns millions of square feet in commercial space, its headquarters are marked only by a small sign outside the front door. That's because Benderson didn't see the point in paying rent or building an office building to accommodate the company. Instead, he opted to move the company's main operations into an empty space in The Shoppes at University Center. Benderson Development bought the shopping plaza seven years ago and has since renovated the project to include landscaping and architectural accents that are now signature elements of Benderson properties.

"We feel that it is always best to make our properties look premiere, and we always believe in keeping up our properties," Benderson says. "People have told me they recognize a Benderson plaza by its look. We take pride in doing what we do."

Benderson has said one of his company's cornerstones for success has been that of retaining properties - a policy that provides a steady stream of revenue and builds equity.

The company now holds more than 35 million square feet in its portfolio, and that's after it sold 18.8 million square feet of its then 800 properties to a company called Developers Diversified Realty four years ago.

"I couldn't refuse what they were offering," Benderson says with a shrug.

Benderson is thrilled that the youngest of his three sons, Randy, is overseeing the company's day-to-day operations as the company's managing director with the help of his son, Shaun.

"That was a dream of mine," Benderson says. Despite the company's success, Benderson says he never once considered taking the business public.

"We like being private and being our own people," he says.

Early beginnings

Known to his childhood friends as Sonny, Benderson grew up in Buffalo, N.Y. His father, Isaac, owned a company that found and sold broken glass.

When the stock market crashed, the family lost its home, altering the way that its members saw business and life.

"I lived through the Depression," Benderson says. "I realized what it was not to have anything when my parents lost their home when the stock market crashed. I was eager to find different ways to try to help my family get along and survive."

By the time Benderson was 16 years old, he had dropped out of high school and founded his own business, Bison Bottling Co., which purchased used bottles and resold them for a profit to bottling companies.

A deal for roughly 1.8 million bottles looked like a goldmine to the young Benderson. He'd never bought or sold so many at one time, and the brewery executive would not sell the bottles to the teenager unless his father signed off on them. But Benderson's father would not participate in the deal.

Rather than retreat, Benderson jumped in his car to hunt for buyers. By the time he'd returned, he'd sold thousands of them. The brewery executive couldn't argue with his results.

The deal had made too much sense. And Benderson had been determined to make the deal happen.

Five years later, Benderson founded Niagara Dry Beverage Company, which made and bottled root beer and other soft drinks. The business took a lot of work, but in time, it thrived.

He married Dora Broder Jan. 1, 1941. World War II put Benderson's bottling aspirations on hold as he was drafted into the U.S. Army. He got back into the business after he was discharged in 1945.

Real estate

Benderson hadn't been looking to get into real estate, but he always was looking for good business opportunities. His first major real estate purchase, the Schreiber Brewery facility, came along in 1950.

Before the auction for the property, Benderson had looked at the facility several times, devising a way to make it pay for itself. He found a partner and spent $275,000 on the property. He spent the next 18 months selling off the brewery's machinery and metals and arranging and completing deals to lease a few of its buildings, lease space for a parking lot and to build and lease a building for a new post office.

The profitability of it all set Benderson on a new course - real estate.

The 1950s and 1960s proved to be a time of growth for Benderson's company, particularly in the way of office development. But office tenants proved restless, wanting to move buildings or rearrange walls. Benderson saw opportunity in commercial development.

The company built multiple commercial sites, including the Niagara Factory Outlet Mall, which has been duplicated several times across the country.

Benderson Development purchased the property for University Town Center, submitting plans for a residential development on the site in 2003, when the company moved its corporate headquarters to Sarasota.

Commissioners balked at the idea of the mall, and Benderson Development came back later with plans for a regional mall. The project's first phase, anchored by the Super Target on University Parkway, was approved in late 2005. The company received final state approval for the remainder of the project in late October 2008.

"My thought was this is the gateway to Sarasota and Lakewood Ranch and it became my dream to own it," Benderson says. "We are committed to this. I personally think this is going to be a destination point for this area. It will stand out by itself."

- Pam McTeer