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Channelside Bay Plaza Scores On Super Bowl

Tribune photo by MICHAEL SPOONEYBARGER

The Bud Bowl block party on Jan. 31 was one of Channelside's Super Bowl-related successes.

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By CHRISTIAN M. WADE | The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 8, 2009

TAMPA - During Super Bowl weekend, tens of thousands of revelers descended on the Channelside Bay Plaza entertainment complex. They ate in the restaurants and drank in the bars, meandered through the red-brick piazza and danced until dawn in nightclubs.

It was a scene that, just a couple years ago, few would have thought possible.

"I can count on my hands events that we've tried to make work that didn't," said Guy Revelle, of Millennium Management Group, an Orlando-based firm that runs several restaurants and clubs in the district. "But last weekend was phenomenal. We broke sales records."

Not that Channelside is likely to rival entertainment complexes such as Faneuil Hall in Boston and Harborplace in Baltimore or even Ybor City's historical Seventh Avenue.

And the verdict is still out on whether investors will see a return on their money.

But the success of the Super Bowl week, when the complex hosted Bud Bowl 2009 and other Super Bowl events, has given backers of the struggling business venture renewed optimism that it could evolve into the major events venue they had envisioned.

"Our original intent was to make Channelside a first-class entertainment facility, and I believe that's finally starting to happen," Revelle said. "We're going to build on this."

Tampa officials, who have been trying to promote the complex as a destination for locals and visitors, viewed Super Bowl weekend as an indication of Channelside's possibilities.

"It was a glimmer of what is to be," said Bob McDonaugh, manager of the city's Channel District redevelopment area. "After all these years, we're beginning to see progress."

Though the city has no direct investments tied up in the entertainment complex, it does have a stake in its success as part of the overall downtown redevelopment efforts.

"It's the entertainment cornerstone of that area," McDonaugh said.

A decade ago, Channelside largely was a ghost town of old industrial warehouses.

Investors such as Revelle saw potential in the riverfront district, situated near at the crossroads of the Tampa Convention Center hotels and the Port of Tampa where cruise ships dock.

Revelle and his partners invested more than $5 million in their four main businesses, Stumps Supper Club, Howl at the Moon, Splitsville and Tinatapas, and spent hundreds of thousands of dollars more to promote the entertainment complex as a destination.

That said, there have been plenty of setbacks.

Besides a revolving door of restaurants and nightclubs, some tenants have complained that there are not enough retail anchors in the entertainment complex to attract patrons.

Officials from the Tampa Port Authority, which leases the land beneath Channelside to the shopping center's owner, Ashkenazy Acquisition Corp. of New York, publically have raised concerns that Channelside is devolving into an Ybor City-like party district.

And several high-profile condo projects intended to put more residents in the Channel District, such as the Towers at Channelside, have been put on hold by the housing crisis.

With that in mind, Channelside's backers have been retooling their business model.

Millennium Management is marketing heavily to fans visiting for basketball tournaments and college bowl games, and Revelle said those efforts are beginning to pay off.

In December, Channelside was ground zero for out-of-town fans of the Iowa Hawkeyes and South Carolina Gamecocks, the teams in Tampa's Outback Bowl.

During Super Bowl XLIII weekend, they hosted the Bud Bowl, and ESPN Radio broadcast the "Mike Tirico & Scott Van Pelt Show" from a booth in the Channelside courtyard.

"That gave us national exposure," Revelle said. "I had friends calling me from all across the country asking how we pulled that off."

Revelle said he wants to build on that exposure and has other big events planned for the complex, such as expanding the July Fourth firework displays to Memorial Day and Labor Day.

They also want to add attractions such as a giant Ferris wheel to the waterfront.

"When people talk about going downtown for a night out or visiting Tampa for a sporting event or convention," he said, "we want them to think Channelside."

Reporter Christian Wade can be reached at cwade@tampatrib.com.

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