Spanier Group In The News 

Colliers International and The Spanier Group, retained by CreateTO, are leading the marketing of the property, one of eight City-owned sites to be unlocked in support of city-building initiatives through the City’s ModernTO program.

“It’s important to be brave — make a significant investment, take a strong consideration to the aspects of place, make a concerted effort on the ground-floor plane, not just the commoditization of development, which is the houses or the offices.”- Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group

“There needs to be more than a bedroom community with condos. It needs to be a true mixed-use, 15-minute city, where you’re 15 minutes from everything, even if you walk or cycle to get there.”- Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group

“Retail helps to create a foundational connection to people. We’re all consumers by nature. We like to buy things and we need to buy things to live. But what retail has done — the retail that I love, which is the best-in-class, independent, non-nationals, the specialty retail — it can actually act as a truly vibrant part of your life”- Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group

“We’re really the hole in the donut of the innovation world. Mississauga is located at the epicentre of the region, which is why we’re designing a district that’s focused on the way people want to work, interact, and live. This is the future of city building, and I think Lakeview’s Innovation District will be the centre of the future,”- Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group

“One of the issues that was happening is that cities weren’t developing themselves [in a way] to think about downtowns. If you thought about a city not having a fire station, or a police station — how could a city not have a downtown? At a certain scale and population, it is a central nervous system for that community. And so I think downtown-as-essential-service is key.”- Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group

“My belief on mixed-use development and true placemaking is that people are going to vote with their feet … And that could be, for some people, third generation children wanting to live next to their parents or grandparents. So, in Vaughan, there’s all this opportunity, the same in Mississauga.” - Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group

"I have a fundamental belief that a smaller retail footprint with large and more generous outdoor spaces that complement indoor space and drive sales is the way to go. We're looking for a mix of independent, non-national, best-in-class retailers. That doesn't mean we'll be ignoring or negating national users, but they will have to align to our vision." - Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group

“To be a [single-family] home owner in the GTA is a serious investment,” says Rob Spanier, President of The Spanier Group, a mixed-use development and placemaking advisor. That often unattainable investment (the current average price of a detached home in the GTA is over $1.7M), or simply a desire to live hassle-free, causes many people to turn to condo ownership or renting. And this is a competitive space, where buyers and renters have a multitude of choices."

“There are many other large-scale mixed-use projects that currently exist or are under development. But what helps set Lakeview Village apart is the fact that we’ve started from the concept of ‘place’, allowing for all other aspects of the community to be built around it. If you create the horizontal place, you can plant all of the uses to truly deliver an incredible development. When we worked through design of the concept, we knew that we had to consider everything, including the ground floor, the appropriate retail programming and tenant mix, and the public realm. And through the establishment of a successful combination of retail, food and beverage and neighbourhood services, we’ve been able to achieve the true essence of ‘place’. Lakeview Village is not a new subdivision. It’s a truly complete community that complements Mississauga’s incredible development pace of the last thirty years and offers a destination that everyone in the Greater Toronto Area will be able to visit and enjoy" - Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group

“Our strategy embraces ongoing changes to the retail landscape and is employing approaches to embed the right conditions for success for future businesses in the Lakeview Village community. A curated and dynamic retail experience will be central to the entire development. It is our vision that Lakeview Village will be a place where retail businesses thrive.” - Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group

“Explosive growth in the GTA has been contained within an ecological greenbelt,” said moderator Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group and Chair of the Advisory Board at the Urban Land Institute, Toronto District Council. “To accommodate the more than 100,000 new residents per year and the associated economic expansion, municipalities in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Areas have been advancing the development of their urban centres in a way that will ultimately deliver a series of vibrant edge cities.”

"We may think we’re looking for things we buy when we go shopping, but what we really want is an experience" - Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group

“Great cities and great developments never end. One of the fundamental mistakes made over the past 25 years is that disposable real estate became the flavour of the decade. A Walmart is a disposable asset. It has a shelf life and a redevelopment opportunity. But when you’re dealing with apartments, in theory the time horizon is much longer.” - Rob Spanier, President of Spanier Group