Outdoor gear store to join Sansom Common

When Penn students need a pair of hiking boots to brave the rough terrain of West Philadelphia or ski apparel for their winter-break trips to the mountains, they soon will not have to travel any farther than Sansom Common. Eastern Mountain Sports, an upscale, 31-year-old chain specializing in outdoor gear, will join the University's new retail and hotel complex in the space between Xando and Urban Outfitters on the building's east side, according to EMS officials. The retailer joins other upscale and trendy stores including the Xando coffeehouse and bar, which opened in August, and Urban Outfitters clothing and Parfumerie Douglas cosmetics, which are scheduled to open later in the fall. Penn officials hoped to attract such a mix of stores to lure more shoppers and foot traffic to University City. The new Penn Bookstore is Sansom Common's anchor tenant. New Hampshire-based EMS will fill the 7,365-square-foot space that City Sports, an athletic-goods chain, was slated to occupy before it opted not to join the complex at the last minute because of internal financial difficulties. Last week, University officials confirmed that they were far along in negotiations with a retailer to fill the former City Sports space, but they declined to name the specific chain. Penn's top real estate official, Tom Lussenhop, said at the time that the new store would likely open by Thanksgiving. "We have a letter of intent and detailed lease negotiations with the new store," Lussenhop said yesterday while refusing to identify the retailer. But Wade Neumeister, the manager of the Langhorne, Pa., EMS store, confirmed the company would open its 116th store in Sansom Common. An official announcement about which new store will join Sansom Common should come in two to three weeks, Lussenhop said. Although Lussenhop said the retailer the University is in negotiations with will "fill the same kind of outdoor recreation needs" as City Sports, there are significant differences between the two stores. While City Sports focuses, as its Web site says, on the "urban-based athlete," specializing in athletic goods such as tennis shoes and other sports-related clothing, EMS sells decidedly non-urban, more-expensive products such as hiking boots and climbing equipment. The addition of EMS instead of City Sports means that when Foot Locker -- currently located in the nearby 3401 Walnut Street complex -- leaves campus, Penn will be left without a store specializing in athletic goods. Lussenhop said in the spring that Penn will not renew Foot Locker's lease this year. He declined to comment on the store's status last week. The addition of EMS will complete the first, $80 million phase of Sansom Common, which is built on the site of a former parking lot. The second phase of the project will include the 256-room Inn at Penn occupying the building's top three stories, an additional two retailers and a restaurant. The entire project is scheduled to be completed by the fall of 1999. In the spring, University officials said they expected City Sports, which has about 10 stores, including one in Center City, to open in the new complex. But internal financial difficulties in the company forced them to pull out at the last minute, according to store officials. "The [athletic goods] industry is in a wild decline," said Michael Kennedy, an official at Massachusetts-based City Sports. "Our job during a downturn is not to expand aggressively, but to be conservative." Both University and City Sports officials said that the store's decision had nothing to do with the viability of the Sansom Common site.