Case Name: MAYOR'S JEWELERS, INC., d/b/a MAYOR'S JEWELERS, Appellant, v. STATE OF CALIFORNIA PUBLIC EMPLOYEES' RETIREMENT SYSTEM, Appellee
Court: Florida District Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1996-12-11
Citations: 685 So. 2d 904
Docket Number: No. 96-0879
Parties: MAYOR’S JEWELERS, INC., d/b/a MAYOR’S JEWELERS, Appellant, v. STATE OF CALIFORNIA PUBLIC EMPLOYEES’ RETIREMENT SYSTEM, Appellee.
Judges: STONE, J., concurs.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 685
Pages: 904–911

Head Matter:
MAYOR’S JEWELERS, INC., d/b/a MAYOR’S JEWELERS, Appellant, v. STATE OF CALIFORNIA PUBLIC EMPLOYEES’ RETIREMENT SYSTEM, Appellee.
No. 96-0879.
District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District.
Dec. 11, 1996.
Suzanne H. Youmans and Richard L. Allen of Engels, Pertnoy, Solowsky & Allen, P.A., Miami, for appellant.
John H. Pelzer and Brian S. McHugh of Ruden, McClosky, Smith, Schuster & Russell, P.A., Fort Lauderdale, for appellee.

Opinion:
KLEIN, Judge.
Appellant, a tenant under a commercial lease, notified appellee, its landlord, that it intended to break its lease in the mall known as Pompano Square. The landlord filed suit for a temporary injunction to restrain the tenant from vacating the store and to compel specific performance of the lease. The trial court granted a temporary injunction, which the tenant appeals. We reverse.
The provision of the lease on which the landlord relies to support its theory that the tenant can be enjoined from breaking its lease is as follows:
OPERATION OF BUSINESS
A. Open for Business. TENANT agrees to occupy and open the PREMISES for business, fully fixtured, stocked and staffed, and thereafter to continuously conduct its business in one hundred percent (100%) of the space within the PREMISES under the name designated, on all business days of the calendar year as described herein. TENANT recognizes that the covenants of TENANT in this ARTICLE 5 are a material consideration to LANDLORD hereunder in order that TENANT might produce the maximum gross sales possible from the PREMISES during the lease term and the continued operation of a full service regional retail development be assured.
This is a case of first impression in Florida; however, almost every other court confronted with this issue has denied injunctive relief requiring a tenant to specifically perform a lease. Like the present case, these cases involve malls or shopping centers with leases under which rent is wholly or partially dependant on the tenants' volume of business. Courts have declined to require continuation of these leases primarily for two reasons.
Most of the cases reason that the injunction would involve the court in having to supervise the future performance, thus putting the court "in the business of managing a shopping center." New Park Forest Assocs. II v. Rogers Enters., Inc., 195 Ill.App.3d 757, 142 Ill.Dec. 474, 479, 552 N.E.2d 1215, 1220 (1 Dist.1990); see also 8600 Assocs. v. Wearguard Corp., 737 F.Supp. 44 (E.D.Mich.1990); Lorch, Inc. v. Bessemer Mall Shopping Ctr., Inc., 294 Ala. 17, 310 So.2d 872, 876 (Ala.1975). This general principle limiting injunctions is part of our jurisprudence. Calumet Co. v. Oil City Corp., 114 Fla. 531, 154 So. 141, 142 (Fla.1934) (denying specific performance of an oil well drilling contract because of the "inability of the court to undertake supeivision of performance of such a contract"). See also Collins v. Pic-Town Water Works, Inc., 166 So.2d 760 (Fla. 2d DCA 1964).
Some of the courts have also denied these injunctions on the ground that the damages are purely economic and there is therefore an adequate remedy at law. 8600 Assocs.; Sizeler Property; see also Center Dev. Venture v. Kinney Shoe Corp., 757 F.Supp. 34 (E.D.Wis.1991). Our conclusion that injunc-tive relief should be denied under these facts, because it would require supervision by the court, makes it unnecessary for us to decide whether there was an adequate remedy at law in this case.
The landlord relies on two cases to support its argument that injunctive relief is available. In one of them, Lincoln Tower Corp. v. Richter's Jeivelry Co., 152 Fla. 542, 12 So.2d 452 (Fla.1943), each tenant had agreed to remain open for business all year round except for holidays. The Florida Supreme Court decided that the tenant could be enjoined from breaching the lease. The case has been cited by landlords as standing for authority that a tenant can be enjoined from breaking a lease and vacating; however, we cannot agree with that broad interpretation. We construe that opinion as standing for the proposition that a tenant who intends to remain a tenant can be enjoined to. remain open for business all year round as required by the lease. As our supreme court explained, the landlord was:
[Djoubtless actuated by a desire to protect and maintain the character of all the property leased to the appellee and its neighbors. By requiring all lessees to be open for trade continuously the unit fell in the category of a year-round business area as distinguished from a seasonal one. It was to its advantage also to require compliance with the restriction against closing because, in some of the leases, the income to the landlord depended to a stated degree on the amount of sales made by the tenants. Another purpose in enforcing the covenant was to assure to all of the tenants the advantage of continued business activity because a client or customer of any place of business in the locality was a potential client or customer, at least, of all the others. It was, therefore, important to the landlord, as well as the tenants, that the condition in the leases be observed by each for the benefit of all. The interests of the landlord and its tenants were in this situation inextricably bound together.
Id. 12 So.2d at 453. There is nothing in the opinion in Lincoln Tower which indicates that the tenant wanted to vacate the premises. The decision does not, therefore, in our opinion, authorize an injunction requiring the continuation of a lease where the tenant intends to terminate and vacate. At least one other court has distinguished Lincoln Tower on that same basis. See Neiv Park Forest, 142 Ill.Dec. 474, 552 N.E.2d at 1218.
The only other case on point relied on by the landlord is Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co. v. Associated Dry Goods Corp., 786 F.Supp. 1403 (N.D.Ind.1992). In that case, the tenant was a department store occupying one-sixth of the mall's space. The court entered a temporary injunction requiring the anchor tenant to stay there until there was a trial on whether a permanent injunction would issue, but required, as a condition, that the landlord post a security bond in the amount of $1,000,000 to compensate the tenant if a permanent injunction were denied. The court also recognized that the relief it was granting was unprecedented. Id. at 1428-30. We decline to follow that case and adopt the majority view that this type of breach of contract is not susceptible to the remedy of an injunction requiring specific performance.
We therefore reverse the temporary injunction.
STONE, J., concurs.
FARMER, J., concurs specially with opinion.
. New Park Forest Assocs. II v. Rogers Enters., Inc., 195 Ill.App.3d 757, 142 Ill.Dec. 474, 478-79, 552 N.E.2d 1215, 1219-20 (1 Dist.1990); 8600 Assocs. v. Wearguard Corp., 737 F.Supp. 44 (E.D.Mich.1990); Sizeler Property Investors, Inc. v. Gordon Jewelry, Corp., 544 So.2d 53 (La.App. 4 Cir.1989); Madison Plaza, Inc. v. Shapira Corp., 180 Ind.App. 141, 387 N.E.2d 483 (1979); Lorch, Inc. v. Bessemer Mall Shopping Ctr., Inc., 294 Ala. 17, 310 So.2d 872, 876 (1975); Grossman v. Wegman's Food Mkts., Inc., 43 A.D.2d 813, 350 N.Y.S.2d 484 (1973); Ambassador Foods Corp. v. Montgomery Ward & Co., 43 Ill.App.2d 100, 192 N.E.2d 572 (1963); Security Builders, Inc. v. Southwest Drug Co. Inc., 244 Miss. 877, 147 So.2d 635 (1962); Price v. Herman, 81 N.Y.S.2d 361 (1948), aff'd, 275 A.D. 675, 87 N.Y.S.2d 221 (1949); Laker v. Soverinsky, 318 Mich. 100, 27 N.W.2d 600 (1947); Green v. Bay City & Port Huron R.R., 158 Mich. 436, 123 N.W. 4 (1909); Grape Creek Coal. Co. v. Spellman, 39 IIl.App. 630 (1891).