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FAREWELL, AL

Sussman turned ICSC from small club into global organization

BY NANCY COHEN

Albert Sussman, CMD, CSM, ICSC’s first head of staff, died at home on June 8, following a long illness. He was 88.

Sussman helped steer ICSC through its difficult early years. Then, in a career that spanned nearly three decades, he nurtured the organization’s growth and maturation.

In January 1958, when Sussman was hired to manage the newly formed association, its entire staff consisted of himself and one secretary, installed together in a tiny fourth-floor office on Park Avenue; at the time, the membership numbered 75. Though he had begun working for ICSC on a part-time basis, he soon committed himself to it full-time, which he called “the happiest decision of my life.” For the next 28 years, he oversaw the organization’s 2,000 percent expansion (membership had reached 15,000 by the time he retired in 1986). Today there are 48,000 members in 77 countries.

“Once Al took over, ICSC began to get continuity and direction, and we felt someone was in charge,” said Donald H. Graham Jr., SCSM, chairman of Honolulu-based developer GMR, who was ICSC chairman for the 1963–’64 term. “Without Al, we might not have ever had an ICSC. It took somebody to be on top of it and hold it all together.”

Sussman remained active in ICSC as an ex-officio member of its Board of Trustees until his death.

As ICSC’s presiding staff officer, Sussman was initially responsible not only for day-to-day operations, but for public relations and membership drives. He also played a leading role in developing ways to stabilize and support the industry through research, education and conventions.

“Nobody knew anything about how to build a shopping center back then,” Sussman recalled once. “People had to learn by the seat of their pants. ICSC created a forum where they could learn from each other. We ran courses on each element, from how to develop and lease a center, to how to do traffic studies and how to decide where to build.”

Among ICSC’s earliest accomplishments was the establishment for a fledgling industry of a series of common practices, including merchants’ associations, lease forms and a ratio of parking space to leasable space. Under Sussman’s leadership, ICSC went on to develop many of its core activities, including idea exchanges, the Spring Convention, research, government affairs programs, professional education and accreditation, and the publication of SCT.

The monthly magazine’s launch in 1979 was the fruit of the idea that had originally brought Sussman in contact with ICSC more than 20 years before. A former newspaper reporter, editor and PR man, he had become aware of the nascent shopping center industry while handling public relations for the Automobile Club of New York. “That’s where the cars were going,” he said. Sussman approached the board of the brand-new association with a proposal to start a magazine to serve the new industry. Though the board deemed the idea premature, the meeting led to his being offered a staff position to help build the organization.

Sussman never regretted the career change. He considered shopping centers “the most exciting business of the 20th century.” It grew from nothing in a span of 30 years to an industry that has revolutionized the distribution of retail goods, altered lifestyles and changed the face of America. He felt privileged, he said, to have been “in the unique position of having seen a whole new industry take seed, flower, grow and multiply” in his own lifetime.

Said former ICSC President and CEO John T. Riordan: “The modern shopping center industry and ICSC grew in tandem. It is an accomplishment in modern economic history. That it parallels so closely Al Sussman’s three decades of leadership is no coincidence.”

In tribute to that leadership, Sussman was named a lifetime trustee of ICSC upon his retirement in 1986. (The honor had been bestowed only once before, upon Leonard L. Farber, ICSC’s co-founder and first chairman [1957–’60], when he stepped from the helm in 1960.)

Sussman’s commitment to education and research extended beyond his ICSC responsibilities. During the 1980s Sussman directed and delivered a series of lectures on real estate development at the Wharton School. In 1986 the industry honored him by establishing the Wharton School’s Albert Sussman Professorship of Real Estate.

In 1995 Sussman donated funds for an archive of historical documents on shopping centers at the ICSC research library, later named the Albert Sussman Library. It contains more than 1,400 volumes of industry reports, surveys, reference materials and other items.

“Though there have been a great many visionaries throughout the history of the shopping center industry, no one man will be remembered quite like Albert Sussman for his zest, foresight and belief that the free exchange of ideas enables an industry to grow and prosper,” said Michael P. Kercheval, ICSC’s president and CEO.

Sussman, a native New Yorker and the son of a butcher, was born in 1916. He graduated from The City College of New York with a degree in English literature, and he served in World War II. He and his wife, Phyllis, raised two children in the Westchester County suburb of Hartsdale, N.Y. Sussman later returned to the city, living since the 1980s in a book-lined East 83rd Street apartment filled with paintings by his late wife and views of Central Park’s treetops. He was a jazz fan who frequented Manhattan’s nightspots into his 80s.

Sussman is survived by two sons, Bernard and Daniel, and three grandchildren.

ICSC’s education foundation has launched a scholarship in Sussman’s honor. The Albert Sussman Professional Education Scholarship will pay for those aspiring to pursue or advance careers in retail real estate to attend the John T. Riordan School for Professional Development. Those wishing to donate to the fund or seeking information may call (646) 728-3800.