Ground to Break for Trump Tower

. October 14, 2008

By Mary Shedden, Tampa Tribune, Fla.

Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News

TAMPA, FL, March 3, 2006. The Donald and his famous coif won't be at today's groundbreaking for the city's newest luxury condo tower.

His name, however, will be all over the $225 million riverfront project: Trump Tower Tampa. As the 52-story skyscraper rises on the city's skyline, Donald Trump's "brand" and all it stands for will be stamped on Tampa's economic image. The New York real estate mogul is best known for luxury high rises, casinos and resorts named after himself. Since his emergence as a reality TV icon on "The Apprentice," though, Trump also has endorsed using his name on board games, men's cologne and even bottled water.

The spillover of that image could affect Tampa in ways bad and good. Some think that if promoted right, Trump Tower Tampa can help transform Tampa's downtown into a place where the rich and famous would want to live. "It puts Tampa a little above the pack," Ron Kuntze, a University of Tampa assistant marketing professor said of the 52-story downtown project he sees as a boost for the city. "It's kind of like the Good Housekeeping seal of approval for real estate and upscale living."

Despite high-profile financial struggles and bankruptcy, Trump's name and his projects still create immediate assumptions of business success and wealth, Kuntze said. "I think he's positioned himself as the ultimate business icon," he said.

His name likely had an impact on how many people signed up for Trump Tower Tampa condos initially priced between $700,000 and $6 million, Kuntze and other brand experts said. A reported 80 percent of the units have had a 20 percent nonrefundable deposit placed on them, despite an estimated 50 percent jump in building costs. Some of those owners and developers from Tampa's SimDag LLC will be at today's groundbreaking, Trump Tower Tampa spokesman David Hooks said. Trump -- whose percentage of investment in the Tampa project is unknown -- won't attend as he and his wife await the birth of their baby, Hooks said.

Trump's real estate properties most often are located in resort towns or much larger cities: New York, Chicago, Atlantic City, Las Vegas, Seoul, Korea. Tampa and Toronto are among the first lesser-known cities to be the site of a Trump nonresort project. The Tampa tower isn't expected to be completed until at least December 2008. Trump has spent decades making his fortune on high-quality real estate such as the Tampa project, said Paul Parkin, partner and founder of SALT, a San Francisco-based branding and communications firm. So far, his off-the-wall endorsement ventures haven't compromised Trump properties, he said. "As long as they continue to build towers with the same standards, there's no risk." he said.

Trump himself admits to being a shameless promoter of products he supports. His Web site -- www.trumponline.com- highlights Trump properties and resorts, as well as a slew of merchandise. There's Trump signature power suits, Trump the fragrance, Trump the board game, Trump Ice bottled water, and even Trump University, an online business school that includes a course on building a brand name.

"If I were to put 'Trump' on everything that came my way -- from potato chips to paper clips -- the power of my name would be diluted," Trump wrote last week in The Trump Blog, a commentary at trumpuniversity.com. "I'm very demanding and selective about where that name goes. And I always try to make sure the letters are in gold."

Parkin said the value of a brand can be diminished if used too much. He points to Richard Branson's Virgin brand in the United Kingdom, where the one-time record label now hawks airlines, cell phones, banks, soda pop and even bridal services as a way to risk weakening the brand. Trump can go too far and hurt his real estate ventures as a result, he said. "If he's not careful, he's running the risk of actually undermining the thing that made him," Parkin said. "Trump Tampa may make sense, but what about Trump Boise? How far does it go?"

How the public perceives Trump the brand is different than it was before "The Apprentice" appeared as a prime-time reality series several years ago, Parkin said. It used to be that Donald Trump the man was defined by the image and success of his buildings and companies. "These have been completely overshadowed by the image of the man," Parkin said. "Now, you evaluate the properties by the identity of a person."

A December survey tracking the popularity of certain brands found that Trump was on a roller coaster of success. The 2005 ImagePower Newsmaker Brands Survey found that television viewers were cooling to confrontational reality shows such as "The Apprentice" and that Trump's name as a celebrity was deemed a loser along with others such as Britney Spears and Howard Stern. But Trump, like Spears and Stern, continued to profit from their brand-associated merchandise, said the national survey conducted by branding specialists Landor Associates and Penn, Schoen and Berland Associates. Parkin said Trump likely will have a sense of humor about his brand, until it hurts his bottom line. "When he stops making money where he makes the bulk of his money, he will start caring," Parkin said.

It remains to be seen if Trump's name can boost the image of Tampa -- a city with more than 300,000 residents, and an estimated 2.5 million in the metropolitan area. Larger cities with Trump projects said they doubt they will frantically promote Trump's arrival in their city. Toronto, Canada's largest city with 2.5 million residents, already has a healthy residential presence in its downtown on the shores of Lake Ontario, said Stuart Green, the city's deputy communications director.

The 70-story condo Trump International Hotel and Tower, which has yet to break ground, is welcome but not essential to be a catalyst for Toronto's residential and financial health, he said. "Is it just another condo? No," Green said. "But at the same time, it's not going to make the city a much better place. It's already a great city."

Trump also is not turning heads in Chicago, where the 90-story Trump International Hotel and Tower is expected to open in 2008. Carolyn Kae Phillips, spokeswoman for the city's economic development arm, World Business Chicago, said Trump's new tower won't significantly change the city's economic image. "We can't imagine it would have any impact on the city of Chicago," said Phillips, the department's director of Strategic Initiatives. "We've got plenty of great brands in the city already."

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