PITTSBURGH — American Eagle Outfitters, Inc. (NYSE: AEO) has announced plans to close hundreds of its flagship American Eagle stores over the course of the next few years, while seeking to grow the company’s more successful lingerie and active-wear brand, Aerie, into a $2 billion business. The Pittsburgh-based company’s chief financial officer, Michael Mathias, announced plans to close 200 to 225 of the company’s 880 existing American Eagle locations over the next two to three years during a virtual investor meeting held Thursday, Jan. 21. “Our primary focus for the next few years with American Eagle will be to build on our large cashflow base by focusing on inventory efficiency, improving merchandise margins, managing expenses and closing stores to strengthen profit flow-through,” said Mathias. The company’s American Eagle banner anticipates roughly flat growth compared to 2019, with an expected revenue of approximately $3.5 billion. By contrast, Aerie revenue is anticipated to grow at a mid-20 percent compounded annual growth rate. The company hopes to open 60 to 75 brick-and-mortar Aerie locations each of the next several years, with Houston and Los Angeles listed as targeted growth markets. “Plans for the Aerie brand through 2023 include doubling revenue to $2 billion, …
FARMERS BRANCH, TEXAS — A partnership between North Texas-based M2G Ventures and Austin-based private equity firm Pennybacker Capital has purchased the 1.2 million-square-foot former distribution center of Tuesday Morning. The sale also included Tuesday Morning’s 105,000-square-foot headquarters office located at 6250 LBJ Freeway. The five-building industrial complex is situated on 46.7 acres in the northern Dallas metro of Farmers Branch. The Dallas-based retailer, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last May, had previously entered into an agreement to sell these assets to Miami-based Rialto Capital for $60 million. Stephen Williamson and Adam Graham of Lee & Associates represented the partnership in the transaction.
CALABASAS, CALIF. — Marcus & Millichap is continuing its growth plan for the firm’s financing subsidiary, Marcus & Millichap Corp. (MMCC), with the appointment of two key executives. The company named Evan Denner as executive vice president and head of business and Paul Lewis to the newly created position of senior vice president and director of agency programs. With nearly 30 years of experience in the commercial real estate industry, including 23 years of capital markets and financing experience, Denner has served as Marcus & Millichap’s head of corporate strategy since 2019. He played a key role in the firm’s recent acquisition of Metropolitan Capital, Mission Capital and LMI. Denner’s experience includes serving a leadership position at Ackman-Ziff Real Estate Group, CEO of the U.S. arm of Hypo Real Estate Capital, head of merchant banking at Cantor Fitzgerald and co-founder and CEO of REIT Quadra Realty Trust. Lewis brings nearly 20 years of experience to Marcus & Millichap. Previously, Lewis served at Fannie Mae and structured $50 billion in multifamily financings with no attributed credit loss, designing key multifamily programs and implementing changes to Fannie Mae’s counterparty risk functions. “The acceleration of MMCC’s growth is a top priority for our …
LAKE COMO, N.J. — Four Springs Capital Trust, a private REIT focused on single-tenant industrial, medical, office and retail assets, has received a $50 million investment from Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) in the form of preferred stock. New Jersey-based Four Springs Capital will use the funds to provide liquidity to an existing investor and to grow its portfolio, which currently consists of 101 commercial properties totaling 3.6 million square feet across 28 states. As of Dec. 31, 2020, that portfolio was valued at $510 million. Goldman Sachs made the investment through one of its Vintage Funds, which provide capital to private investors and asset managers worldwide.
BOCA RATON, FLA. — ODP Corp. (Nasdaq: ODP), the parent company of Office Depot, has rejected USR Parent Inc.’s off-market transaction offer to acquire the Boca Raton-based retailer. USR, the parent company of office products retailer Staples and affiliate of Sycamore Partners, offered to buy ODP for $40 per share in an all-cash deal that would equate to roughly $2.1 billion. In a letter to Stefan Kaluzny, managing director of Sycamore Partners and a member of the board of directors at USR, ODP’s chairman of the board of directors Joseph Vassalluzzo said the company is not opposed to selling, but “what we do not plan to do, however, is engage in a transaction that, as history has shown, would likely result in a prolonged and expensive regulatory review process with no guarantee of success.” In the letter, Vassalluzzo did not rule out the merger altogether, stating: “In addition, we are open to combining our retail and consumer-facing ecommerce operations with Staples under the right set of circumstances and on mutually acceptable terms.” ODP owns Office Depot, OfficeMax and IT-services business CompuCom. ODP has been in the process of selling CompuCom since November 2020. According to The Wall Street Journal, USR …
BOCA RATON, FLA. — Polo Realty Group and Kay Commercial Realty have been selected to lead the leasing effort for The Milan at Boca Center, a seven-story office building in Boca Raton. Roger Steinhardt of locally based Polo Realty and Bill Klein of New Jersey-based Kay Commercial will handle leasing on behalf of the undisclosed owner. The Milan at Boca Center is located at 1675 N. Military Trail, three miles west of downtown Boca Raton. Comerica Bank anchors the asset, which is also partially leased to Salon Sora.
AUSTIN, TEXAS — Data center REIT Digital Realty Trust (NYSE: DLR) will relocate its global headquarters from San Francisco to Austin. In announcing the move, Digital Realty cited the state’s affordable cost of living for employees, as well as its highly educated workforce and pro-business climate as the key drivers of the relocation. Data Center Knowledge reports that Digital Realty has about 30 data centers in Texas spanning 4 million square feet with a capacity for more than 120 megawatts of power. Details about the company’s new office property were not released. Digital Realty joins Oracle and Tesla as the latest publicly traded companies originally based in California to make sizable investments or relocations in Austin.
SAN DIEGO — Petco ended its first day of trading on Nasdaq on Thursday at $29.40 per share, 63 percent higher than its initial public offering (IPO). The San Diego-based pet care retailer is trading under the stock symbol WOOF. Petco priced its IPO at $18 per share, and the stock price opened at $26 per share Thursday. Petco operates more than 1,500 stores in the United States, Puerto Rico and Mexico and sells food, toys and healthcare needs for a variety of pets. Additionally, more than 100 Petco locations offer in-store veterinary services.
PHILADELPHIA — Urban Outfitters (NASDAQ: URBN) reported an 8.4 percent sales decrease for the two months that ended on Dec. 31, 2020 compared with the same period a year earlier. The Philadelphia-based apparel retailer said that lower sales within its brick-and-mortar stores were partially offset by double-digit sales growth across the digital platforms of its family of brands, which includes Free People and Anthropologie Group. For the fiscal year 2020, the company’s net sales declined by 14.3 percent year-over-year, although the retailer did open 18 new stores over the last 12 months. In addition, Urban Outfitters has announced that current CEO Trish Donnelly will be stepping down on Jan. 31, 2021 after a seven-year stint with the company and will be replaced by Sheila Harrington. Urban Outfitters’ stock price opened at $27.90 per share on Wednesday, Jan. 13, up from $26.47 per share a year ago.
MOORESTOWN, N.J. — Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust (PREIT) has received a zoning approval that will allow the Philadelphia-based mall owner to add up to 1,065 multifamily units and a hotel to its Moorestown Mall in Southern New Jersey. For PREIT (NYSE: PEI), which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in early November, the move is part of a larger effort to diversify the real estate at several of its regional malls. Dubbed a “densification plan” by company executives, PREIT’s plan to sell parcels of land to multifamily developers is expected to generate as much as $150 million in proceeds that will be used to reduce its outstanding debt. The company is in the process of delivering 3,500 apartments across its properties as part of the initial phase of the plan, which could ultimately see as many as 7,000 multifamily units and several hotels added to PREIT’s properties. The first phase of the multifamily component at Moorestown Mall will consist of 375 units and a hotel with an unspecified number of rooms. “Our foresight has shaped a high-quality portfolio with a strong retail core that attracts a distinctive mix of new uses to redefine the future-ready retail and leisure district,” said …