Former Butler Street Bazaar Sells for $1.8 Million

     The nearly 50,000-square-foot warehouse that used to be home to Butler Street Bazaar has been sold for $1.8 million, but plans are on hold until more is known about the Tennessee Brewery development across the street.
     The warehouse, built in 1948, sits on 1.68 acres at the southeast corner of Butler Avenue and Tennessee Street. The Butler Street Bazaar market opened there in 2002 and closed in 2005.
     Butler Park Station LLC last week bought the property from Back Alley Properties LLC for $1.8 million, financing it with a $1.3 million loan through Landmark Community Bank. The selling entity is related to the Magdovitz family, which has owned the property for several decades.
     Buyer Berry Jones, managing member of Front Street-based design firm Architectural CustomWorks, said plans for the property are in a holding pattern until the Tennessee Brewery plans are firmed up.
     "They're actually talking to us too about our property, about maybe doing something together or maybe buying it from us or something," Jones said. "So we're not really sure, and a lot is hinging on that, and of course, that's all tied up in the regulatory process right now."
     More than a century old, the former brewery is located at 495 Tennessee St. A team of developers wants to turn it into condos, but has met resistance from neighbors because of its proposed height.
     Land planner Brenda Solomito, owner of Solomito Land Planning and representative of the development team, said her clients had met with the neighbors and June West from Memphis Heritage, and the developers were going "back to the drawing board."
     "But I don't know if we're going to go forward or not," Solomito said. "(The Tennessee Brewery developers) were trying to see if they could make the project work with some of the requests from the neighbors, and I don't know if they've finished that due diligence yet."
     Brett Magdovitz, whose grandfather bought the property several decades ago, said the family wanted to develop the property but, due to a number of circumstances, felt it in their best interest to sell.
     "I tried diligently to put together a package for actually our property and the brewery, being that the Butler Street Bazaar building was originally built as a distribution and bottling plant of the brewery," Magdovitz said. "It was built right really when the brewery had its heyday after prohibition ended."
     For more on the brewery, see The Daily News' Nov. 15 lead story at www.memphisdailynews.com.

Alan Shapiro to Speak At River City Writers Series

     North Carolina poet Alan Shapiro will be the first guest of the spring River City Writers Series at the University of Memphis. The event is Tuesday and Wednesday.
     Shapiro, an instructor at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, will read from his work Tuesday at 8 p.m. in the Psychology Auditorium at the U of M.
     Shapiro is the author of nine volumes of poetry, two memoirs, a work of criticism and a collection of essays. His most recent books of poetry are "Tantalus in Love" and "Song and Dance." His awards and honors include those from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Guggenheim Foundation and the Los Angeles Times Prize for Poetry.

ServiceMaster Site Plan Goes Before LUCB

     At the Thursday meeting of the Memphis and Shelby County Land Use Control Board, planning officials will discuss publicly for the first time a proposed site plan for ServiceMaster Co.'s new Memphis-area corporate headquarters. The site plan, regarding acreage at the southeast corner of Tenn. Highway 385 and Forest Hill-Irene Road, calls for a four-building corporate office campus with 800,000 square feet of total floor area.
     ServiceMaster's relocation to Memphis, officially announced three months ago, involves transferring from Downers Grove, Ill., the headquarters of the Fortune 500 company focused on housecleaning, pest control and landscaping services. In November, chairman and CEO J. Patrick Spainhour said company officials are considering whether to put it up for sale.
     The company, which had $4 billion in sales last year, hired the Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs investment banks to begin exploring the possible sale.

Sam Davidson Named President of FaxonGillis

     Jerry Gillis, president and CEO of FaxonGillis Homes, announced Tuesday that Sam Davidson has moved into the roles of president and chief operating officer at FaxonGillis. Davidson has been in the homebuilding industry for more than 25 years. He has served as vice president of operations for the past eight years.
     Gillis will remain as chairman and CEO and Bobbi Gillis will remain as executive vice president and secretary for the company.
     Other management changes are: Joanne Gutowsky, senior vice president of internal operations; Chuck LaBarreare, senior vice president of field operations; and Josh Holley, vice president, principal broker and sales manager.
     FaxonGillis had sales revenue of more than $35 million in 2006 and has maintained an annualized growth rate in excess of 20 percent for the past five years, according to company officials.