The battle for Long Island has officially ended with a victory for the Barclays Center and developer Bruce Ratner. On Thursday, Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano awarded the contract for the renovation of the Nassau Coliseum in Uniondale, N.Y. to Ratner, who built the Barclays Center in nearby Brooklyn.
Barclays Center CEO Brett Yormark will manage the new facility, in a deal that begins in June 2015 when Nassau’s lease with the Islanders and current management company SMG concludes. Manhattan-based Madison Square Garden made an unsuccessful competing bid for the highly-prized project in the country’s largest media market, as did Global Spectrum and SMG.
Ratner plans to turn Nassau Coliseum into a sprawling mixed-use entertainment district that includes a vibrant new design for the Coliseum, a 2,000-person Fillmore Theater concept, a movie theater, bowling center, food bazaar, restaurants, nightclubs and a flexible space that can be used for concerts in the summer and ice-skating in the winter. Ratner and his group have agreed to privately finance $229 million in development costs.
“When you look at Nassau and Suffolk counties combined, they are markets similar to Brooklyn that have been underserved for some time,” Yormark said. “This project will turn Long Island into a world-class entertainment destination, and more importantly, draw upon synergies between the two markets.”
Two very distinct markets, Yormark points out. Only about eight percent of Brooklyn Nets basketball tickets are sold to families on Long Island, and only about 13 percent of total tickets go to the 7.6 million people living on the most densely populated island in the U.S.
“We absolutely plan to have artists play both facilities,” whether it’s on the same tour, or two separate tours, explained Yormark. And despite the announcement that Nassau’s tenant team, the New York Islanders, have agreed to move to Barclays for the start of the 2015-2016 season, the deal means that Yormark can move several Islanders' home games back to Long Island. When asked if the Islanders tie-in helped lock in the deal, Yormark said “Yeah, because its something that will endure over time. It was a point of differentiation for us and allowed local fans to enjoy something they grew up watching. It was a fairly sizable advantage for us.”
And while SMG will retain control of the building for about two more years, Yormark said "my goal is to start the transformation now, to get out there and help the current management team,” Yormark said. "I want to understand who the major players are publicly and commercially. Why wait two years? Let’s start now.”
Barclays designers SHoP Architects will draw up the building's façade, while Gensler will recast the front-and-back-of-house interiors. The Coliseum will be shrunk to a 13,000-capacity buildingwith a curtaining system that can scale from 4,000 to 8,000 seats.
The building was a strong performer for SMG and one of their top East Coast facilities.
“It’s a great market with over 3 million people who really support live entertainment, especially pop and Top 40,” said Jon Petrunak, VP of Booking for SMG during a June 5 interview, noting that some shows have done double dates in Long Island and Manhattan, but it's generally an individual tour decision.
"The biggest problem you run into is the limited number of available dates,” he said. “If a tour only has 30 dates scheduled for North America, they have to ask themselves how many are they going to commit to the New York market.
Yormark hopes to book 300 shows per year at the building and have a music programming partnership with Live Nation, which books the nearby Nikon at Jones Beach Theater in nearby Wantagh, N.Y. It’s a departure from their deal for booking and management support at Barclays Center with AEG, but it’s not the only contract that didn’t carry over. While Barclays has an agreement with Levy for concessions at the Brooklyn-based arena, Yormark said his group decided to pursue a food contract with Legends Hospitality for the Nassau facility.
“We, as a company, always had a desire to work with the Yankees brand and decided to closely align with them in Long Island,” he explained.
The deal also includes a first of its kind with RocNation, a full-service entertainment company owned by Jay-Z with a big roster that includes Shakira, Rihanna and super DJs Calvin Harris and deadmau5. RocNation’s role at the facility is unclear, but the partnership gives Nassau a great shot at booking dozens of world-class artists.
Interviewed for this article: Brett Yormark, (917) 618-6700; Jon Petrunak, (610) 729-7912