Bill Shown is CEO of Pearl Build, one of the three companies formed from splitting Pearl into separate companies focusing on different aspects of the larger former company. Pearl Build will focus on construction and development work and is considering projects outside Pearl’s footprint.
T hree companies that used to be one split from Pearl last July — but each still plays an active role in the San Antonio hotspot. The three companies are headed by Pearl veterans and have their own focus and an enlarged staff. The idea, originating from Silver Ventures CEO Bryant Ambelang, enables the companies to be “more nimble, more independent and more focused,” says Bill Shown.
Bill Shown, who started his career as a real estate lawyer, recalls telling Christopher “Kit” Goldsbury, the owner of Silver Ventures, that his plan to remake Pearl was a “terrible idea.” He went on to become Pearl’s first employee in 2005.
“I just knew that they needed somebody, and I thought, ‘If somebody screws this up, I want it to be me,’” he said.
He is now CEO of Pearl Build, one of three companies that the company behind Pearl has been split into. Outside work, he enjoys training Labrador retrievers and bird hunting with them. He and his wife of 35 years have a hobby of building and renovating homes.
He sat with the Express-News to talk about the future of the new company he leads.
Q: Silver Ventures still owns a lot of undeveloped land along the river. What might you do there?
Shown: It feels residential to me. I think there’s opportunities for some commercial components, maybe some small restaurants.
Q: What about the site on the river across Grayson from La Gloria? Omar has been quoted as saying it could serve as a corporate headquarters.
Shown: We were looking at that at one point, and it just never felt right. It felt almost like it might be too much for the site. What we’re considering right now — and this is in early, early conversations — is a mixed-use development that has some office, some ground-floor commercial.
Q: What about the property Silver Ventures owns near Hemisfair?
Shown: We love the idea of maybe doing a small boutique hotel that incorporates those two old school buildings.
One of the things that we do, and it’s nonnegotiable for us, is for our projects to reflect the history and heritage of their locations. So whatever happens at Southtown, it’s not going to be Pearl phase two. It’s going to be reflective of Southtown. Southtown’s a little bit grittier, a little bit crunchier.
Q: Last year, the Express-News quoted you as being “really concerned” about your plans to build a seven-story apartment building on Elmira Street. I’m curious how that turned out.
Shown: Horribly. The cost environment today is just awful. Every time we go to price something, it comes in higher and higher and higher, so we scramble to try to figure out, “OK, how do we react to this?” The commodities prices go through the roof.
We’re going to be able to get (the Elmira project) under control, but my God, it’s been a horrible journey. That’s the wrong word to use — it’s been extremely challenging.
Q: Will you be building affordable housing?
Shown: Yes. Your question is so perfectly timed. We just had a development meeting that ended about 30 minutes ago where we were having this exact discussion, to build some of what we’re calling “Pearl associate housing.” The idea is that we would create some housing the Pearl associates could afford to live in.
Q: How might you achieve that?
Shown: We have a project with some surplus parking, so it’s possible that we can build another housing project and not have any parking costs associated with it. A typical class A apartment has extensive amenities. All those are very expensive, so the idea is, what if we built housing that was just housing, and it was not laden with amenities? With the idea being that the amenity is Pearl.
This is all being challenged by construction costs. And it’s going to be challenged by interest rates. So we’re undertaking this in the face of some pretty stiff headwinds.
Elizabeth Fauerso is CEO of Potluck Hospitality, which focuses on the hospitality aspect at Pearl.
Elizabeth Fauerso has a background in advertising and previously was Pearl’s chief marketing officer. A graduate of Trinity University, she travels frequently, listing recommendations for restaurants in Mexico City with ease.
As CEO of newly formed Potluck Hospitality, one of three companies that the company behind Pearl has been split into, she takes her team on “culinary exploration” trips to experience regional cuisines and meet with other restaurant groups and chefs.
She sat with the Express-News to talk about the future of the new company she leads.
Q: Where might you consider developing concepts outside Pearl?
Fauerso: We have so much on our plate — hospitality pun, unavoidable — right now at Pearl. We have almost 200,000 square feet we’re developing here. At the end of 2024, all of those things should be open and stabilized.
Obviously, our first focus will be San Antonio. There’s a lot going on here. We’ll do what makes sense. We’ll see what kind of partners emerge.
Q: Tell me about how you developed Carriqui.
Fauerso: When it was acquired, the building was about to fall down. It was really in a fragile condition, but it still had such beautiful bones. It took us time to think, “What could this be?”
Then the idea emerged: All of us that are from South Texas, we inherently experience our culture, our food ways. Thinking about one place that almost feels like you go to somebody’s house, where they could serve a meal that is comprised of the elements that make up our South Texas food.
Q: Where did the name come from?
Fauerso: It’s named after a green jay. The only place in the U.S. that this green jay is ever found basically starts at the Rio Grande Valley and stops at San Antonio. The idea is, as the carriqui flies, that’s our food. We’ll be serving barbacoa every day, brisket every day, roasted whole fish from the Gulf, grilled shrimp, roasted chicken. We’ll have nachos the correct South Texas way — not pile style. We’ve had long, very passionate conversations about nachos.
Fauerso: Like a pile of chips with stuff on it, which to me, that’s not nachos. Each chip has to be treated with respect.
Q: Tell me about what you’re doing with the Stable.
Fauerso: What emerged for us during COVID is that Pearl shows up as such a public gathering place. The fact that the Stable, which is such a special historic building on the property, was mostly closed to the public, because it was private events, started to feel like it wasn’t in sync with the neighborhood.
Thinking about the deep history of music in San Antonio — you know, this is the birthplace of brown-eyed soul — there’s a lot of music history here. Let’s bring that back. It’s not a huge space, but we see ourselves, admittedly ambitiously, trying to be in the company of the Ryman (Auditorium) in Nashville, or places like Pres(ervation) Hall in New Orleans, which is even smaller than this, but it’s just a special place to play.
Q: What lessons have you learned during your time with Silver Ventures?
Fauerso: The power of density. There’s a complexity to it, of course, but what I’ve seen over and over and over again is that density drives possibility. When you think about the challenges that we’ve had with our downtown, we still do not have enough residential density to support a true small business community.
Mesha Millsap is CEO of the Pearl Real Estate Co., one of three companies formed from splitting up the company that oversaw Pearl.
Mesha Millsap joined Silver Ventures as an accountant in 2007 and later moved into the operations side of the business, managing the team that ran event venues such as Pearl Stable. She is now CEO of the recently created Pearl Real Estate Co., one of three companies that the company behind Pearl has been split into.
A native of San Angelo, she comes from a long line of accountants. She is closely involved in her church community and in her two daughters’ youth sports. She and her husband like to compete playing golf together.
She sat with the Express-News to talk about the future of the new company she leads.
Q: Will you be leading Pearl in new directions?
Millsap: We started, during COVID, to really focus more on the pedestrians, but you’re going to see that focus increase. And the way that will show up is that you’ll start to see some interior streets that may be closed.
As a part of that, we’re talking about how do we encourage the biking community to come here? How do we work on transportation and ride share, getting people here so that they don’t necessarily have to bring a car?
Q: You mentioned that you’re looking to add more retail versus restaurants. What kinds of retail?
Millsap: We recognize that there’s some missings in our retail mix. Men’s is one thing that has shown up. We constantly are trying to figure out how can we do more things for kids. We feel like we could have more services here.
Q: How do you feel about the office market?
Millsap: You know, we actually feel really good about the office market. During COVID, we opened a cowork business (Pearl Cowork). That’s something that I don’t know a lot of people know about yet. So we have this cowork business that’s been around for just over a year, and it’s full. One thing that we have seen is that some of those small businesses that have started in cowork are now looking for permanent office space.
Q: Do you see more office space being added to Pearl?
Millsap: We will add some more office space. The big thing that I would say is that we have a real appetite for mixed-use. One of the things that we saw during COVID was that part of the strength of what we’ve done is we’ve built in multiple uses, so we weren’t dependent on just office or just retail or just restaurant or just residential.
Q: I’ve seen people complain about how Pearl’s parking isn’t free anymore.
Millsap: I can tell you that the decision to charge for parking was not made lightly. It’s something we wrestled with for many years. What the parking revenue is going to allow us to do is to continue to invest in the spaces that our community can come and enjoy. There’s a lot of things that we do where we don’t charge for anything.
I know there have been complaints. I know that San Antonio is not a community that really likes to pay for parking. And I understand that. I don’t love to pay for parking either. But the reality is, it’s a step that will allow us to continue to provide things in a different way. That’s part of the reason why you’re going to see us start to focus more on how can we get people here by other means.
Richard Webner is a freelance business writer and former real estate reporter for the Express-News. He earned a graduate degree in journalism from the University of Missouri and an undergraduate degree in History from Northwestern University.