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The former Owings Mills Mall site will be redeveloped as an outdoor shopping center called Mill Station, a $108 million project to be anchored by a new Costco warehouse store. Mark Millman, president and CEO of Millman Search Group, a retail consulting and executive search firm based in the area, said he believes Costco “can more than hold its own.”

“They draw a huge crowd [and] very loyal customers,” he said. “It should help elevate the quality of the type of center that Kimco is trying to establish.”

It is all a far cry from the sluggish days of the past recession and its aftermath, when bulldozers sat idle and jobs in such fields as retail construction had all but vanished, says Mark Millman, founder and CEO of executive recruiting firm Millman Search Group. “The need for quality executives has increased dramatically, along with the numbers of people developers are looking to bring on board,” Millman said. “Macroeconomics, the industry and the economy are all buzzing along very well.”

To succeed in the current retail climate, Harborplace will need to attract tenants that appeal to millennial consumers, such as new food and entertainment concepts, and to market itself aggressively, said Mark Millman, president and CEO of Millman Search Group, a retail consulting and executive search firm. Food and entertainment experiences have become the hook to attract people to something they can’t replicate online, he said.

“Food is the new fashion in retail leasing,” Millman said. “Those are the deals that are getting done, where millennials will shop.”