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CLAYTON — The Clayton School District is set to buy the Caleres company headquarters adjacent to Clayton High School for a plan called the Empowerment Campus Project.
The cost of the 9-acre site at 8300 Maryland Avenue will be disclosed when the property closes in February, according to district officials. The current appraised value of the property, which the company has been trying to sell since 2021, was $33.5 million, according to St. Louis County records.
If the deal goes through, St. Louis County stands to lose more than $1 million in annual tax revenue, current records show.
Details on the district’s plans for the site are scarce, with Superintendent Nisha Patel saying “the exact scope of work will be determined over the coming months as part of a long-range facilities plan” in an email Tuesday to the community.
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Funds for the property will come from a 20-year financing plan using capital improvement funds, Patel said.
The purchase agreement allows the company, which employs more than 400 in Clayton, to stay in the property for up to 15 months after closing, Patel said.
Jay Schmidt, president and CEO of Caleres, confirmed the deal in a Tuesday email. Schmidt said the purchase includes the entire Caleres campus in Clayton, including 8300 and 8400 Maryland Avenue and the Topton Way parking lot.
“Caleres has been an important corporate citizen of Clayton for more than 70 years, and we are pleased the sale will support the significant expansion of the Clayton School District footprint and positively impact the community,” Schmidt said in the statement. “Caleres is connected and committed to the Clayton community and our goal is to remain here in a modern and flexible workspace that meets the evolving needs of our business and corporate Associates.”
Patel said additional updates about the school district’s plans for the property will be coming in the next few months.
“As is the case with any ambitious undertaking, we will include all of our district community stakeholders, including our students, staff, parents, and community members,” Patel wrote in the email. “We also recognize that the City of Clayton is currently revisiting its comprehensive plan known as Clayton Tomorrow 2040 and we are committed to working with them to ensure both plans are complementary to one another.”
But Clayton Mayor Michelle Harris said she is disappointed that the property will be sold to the school district.
“We have the utmost respect for the school district and really value them as a partner,” Harris said Tuesday. “But this development is really not the best in terms of the health and long-term sustainability for the city of Clayton.”
Harris says the city would miss out on tens of millions in property tax revenue over the next 20 years, and the school district itself would lose five times as much.
Just as important as the revenue, Harris said, is the loss of energy downtown from a new retail, entertainment or residential project.
“We hope the school district will try to partner with us to try to create more vitality there,” she said.
Enrollment in Clayton schools is 2,427 in kindergarten through 12th grades this year, down 9% from a high of 2,681 students in 2018.
Founded as Brown Shoe Co. in 1878, Caleres has been shopping its headquarters since 2021 with the goal of having a developer remake it while also cashing in on the competitive demand for Clayton’s real estate that often commands the highest prices in the region.
But high interest rates have made developments more expensive and riskier and have affected nearly every commercial real estate deal in the country.
Most recently, local development firm Pier Property Group was slated to take over the campus until the deal fell through in October. This was the second developer to drop the property; the first being real estate development firm CRG, which had a $500 million plan for the campus.
Though Caleres reported its best financial year in 2022, the footwear brand reported a revenue of $761.9 million in earnings for third quarter 2023, down 4.6% from third quarter 2022.
Mark Schmitt, Caleres’ senior vice president and chief logistics officer, has previously said in a statement that the company intends to stay in Clayton.
Caleres operates through its Famous Footwear and Brand Portfolio segments.
Steph Kukuljan of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.
Brown has been part of the corporate name since the company’s founding in 1878. Next month, however, that name will be dropped once shareholders approve the change on May 28. (Post-Dispatch video)
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