On Town Square Grocery and Pavilion, Council Asks ‘What’s in a Naming Right?’

Naming rights for the Rockville Town Square Plaza pavilion have emerged as a sticking point in the ongoing negotiations to bring a grocery to the retail center. 

But before the City Council grants the grocer those rights, as part of an agreement on signage that the council must approve, council members say they’d prefer to know just what the name on the pavilion—and on the market—might be.

Federal Realty Investment Trust, the owner and operator of Town Square, and Ellwood Thompson’s Local Market, the prospective tenant for the grocery space at 255 N. Washington Street, have worked out the style and location of signs for the market, Robin McBride, vice president and Mid-Atlantic region chief operating officer for Federal Realty, told the council on Monday.

The two parties worked with Comsource Management, Inc., which manages , McBride said.

The sign plan includes not putting signs on portions of Town Square that are residential and addressing concerns about “visibility from lighting on the signs as well as blocking views from residents,” she said.

The proposed solution is advertising the grocery on “lollipop signs” on the ground around Town Square, she said.

The lease is contingent upon Ellwood Thompson’s receiving naming rights for the pavilion that is located at the end of Town Square Plaza closest to the store space at Gibbs and North Washington streets, McBride said.

The pavilion is part of . Rockville is in the process of turning over maintenance of the square and other common areas of the retail center—including management of the center’s parking garages—to Federal Realty.

“Having the name incorporated in the pavilion on the plaza is a deal-breaking point for [Ellwood Thompson’s owner Rick Hood],” McBride said.

The market’s entrance would be on North Washington Street. The market space backs on to Gibbs Street at the west end of the plaza.

“Because again there’s no visibility to his storefront directly on Gibbs or to any of the folks who are in the public plaza area—which is quite a popular part of Rockville Town Square, he wants to make sure that there’s appropriate signage that has his name on it on the plaza and wants to have the naming rights on the pavilion,” McBride said.

Ellwood Thompson’s is “95 percent certain that they are going to name this market something that’s organic to the Rockville neighborhood and history” and could hold a contest for choosing the name, McBride said. The Richmond market takes its name from the cross-streets where it is located.

Marcuccio said Thursday that a Rockville-oriented name would make granting naming rights—something she supports—more palatable.

Councilman Piotr Gajewski said on Monday that he wants to be sure that the council will have an opportunity to sign off on the pavilion name.

“The only issue is that we find a legal mechanism,” Gajewski said. “It would be negligent for us to sign off on the name now. I expect I will approve anything that the [owner] comes up with.”

Councilman Mark Pierzchala said he was less worried about the name and more worried that the lease agreement not be jeopardized.

“I don’t think it’s any big deal to have the naming rights [go] to the store,” Pierzchala said on Monday.

Ellwood Thompson’s is taking a chance on a space that other grocery chains have ruled out as a viable location, he said. “It has such an unproven track record that if all it takes to get the deal done is to put a name on the pavilion, and that is a deal-breaker, and we are down to our last place, I just don’t see the issue with it.”

Councilman John Britton said on Monday that he does not “have a strong opinion one way or another” on the naming rights, but trusts that Ellwood Thompson’s will be involved in the community based on their reputation in Richmond. There the store is “very prominent on two major thoroughfares,” Britton said, versus the proposed location where it will tucked into a corner of Rockville Town Center.

Councilwoman Bridget Donnell Newton said that she has “strong reservations” about granting the naming rights, especially without public input, but said that she would not vote against the sign plan.

“The one thing that the community fought so hard to get was a pavilion and a town square that’s theirs and then to take that name away—the connection between the Town Square pavilion and the grocery, it hasn’t yet sunk in to met that that it’s so important,” she said on Monday.

In an interview on Thursday, Marcuccio said that she did not share Newton’s concern about the name.

“Town Center is—what—four years old?” she said. “How much tradition can you have?”

The council is expected to vote on the sign plan, including the naming rights to the pavilion, at its next meeting on Aug. 15.

The council would vote to amend a plan that it passed on April 25, which allows signs for the market to be placed on the storefront and on the Town Square garage, including on the garage’s façade on Hungerford Drive, which will require relocating the “Crossroads” neon sculpture.

“Well, I think you have certainly bent over backwards here to address their signage needs,” Marcuccio told McBride on Monday. “I’m floored. Good luck. Unless they’d want the street painted with the sign, I can’t imagine another place they’d want it.”

“Don’t bring it up in a public forum,” McBride said, laughing.

This is not the first time names have been an issue in attracting potential tenants to Rockville Town Center. Choice Hotels International proposed changing the name of East Middle Lane to Choice Hotels Lane, as part of moving its headquarters from Silver Spring.

In April, the Planning Commission rejected the name change in a 4-2 vote.

On July 12, .