In a gesture of fun and overwhelmingly goodwill, the owner of The Park at Cross Creek shopping center in Malibu has paid a friendly tribute to a rival shopping center owner across Pacific Coast Highway. Steve Soboroff, the well-known businessman who built the center that houses Whole Foods market, has erected a seven-foot-tall blow-up Los Angeles Rams character in honor of LA’s local team making it to the Super Bowl this Sunday. The blow-up Rams figure at the amphitheater area of the shopping center is also in tribute to Soboroff’s friend Stan Kroenke who owns Malibu Colony Plaza, the LA Rams team, and who built SoFi Stadium, where the big game will take place Sunday.
Soboroff is impressed with the team’s success and his friend who made it happen in Los Angeles.
“The world is looking at Stan’s house. Stan Kroenke is a Malibu resident (one of many homes), but the house he built is the Rams’ house. It’s the greatest venue for NFL football or any kind of football or soccer ever built in the world,” Soboroff praised of SoFi Stadium.
Soboroff thought with all the excitement about the combination of Kroenke’s team, the Rams, and his house, SoFi Stadium, it was a fitting gesture to honor the Rams and “what he’s [Kroenke’s] done for Los Angeles and the NFL [National Football League] world. I thought it’d be a little tip of the hat to him.”
The Whole Foods Malibu developer has been having fun watching visitors pose with the Rams’ blow-up figure on a mall security camera and said if it blew away in strong winds, he has another to replace it.
The businessmen have been friends for 20 years. Soboroff characterized their relationship not as not competitors but claimed, “We provide complimentary stuff. I know he sometimes comes over and eats at Howdy’s.”
If the Rams win, and Soboroff predicts the team will, he says he’ll probably get another blow-up character outfitted in a Super Bowl champs T-shirt to display. The property developer has been a Rams fan since the Eric Dickerson days when the Rams played at the Coliseum. The Los Angeles Rams have yet to win a Super Bowl.
“The idea that this resident built a stadium for six-billion dollars of his own money and built the finest building in the world. I think it’s cool,” the businessman said. “In this environment, everybody’s trying to criticize somebody, but this is a competitive tip of the cap. Good Luck.”
Soboroff ended his interview with The Malibu Times with a plea to those about to watch the big game Sunday.
“Another thing he [Kroenke] and I would agree on is to wear a mask and get vaccinated. It is serious. There are a bunch of anti-vaxxers out there, and it’s silly. I think it’s one thing everybody agrees with. Whether you’re watching it [Super Bowl LVI] on TV or going to SoFi Stadium, I think that he and I would both agree on that.”
Although mask compliance at last week’s playoff game at SoFi was generally not adhered to, Soboroff reminded, “It’s the rules. Even if you’re home and have friends over, even if you’re walking around and watching it on TV at Barefoot Dreams, which has a 90-inch TV, more than beating the Bengals, we need to beat COVID. Stop the Bengals and stop COVID. This stuff spreads like wildfire. One in five people have it. Think about that. If you have ten people over to your house, that means two of them…somebody’s going to be infected. We have to be careful.”
When The Malibu Times mentioned to Soboroff the lack of mask usage at the playoffs, he responded, “They’re doubling down on that. I don’t think they’re going to throw people out, but this is an important issue.”