ST. LOUIS — HREC Investment Advisors has arranged the sale of the Holiday Inn Airport West-Earth City in St. Louis. The sales price was not disclosed. The 155-room hotel is located less than eight miles from Lambert-St. Louis International Airport. Ted Anka and Tom Sommer of HREC represented the undisclosed seller in the transaction.
ST. LOUIS — JAB Holding Co., the private investment firm that purchased Krispy Kreme Doughnuts last year, has agreed to purchase Panera Bread Co. (NASDAQ: PNRA) in a transaction valued at approximately $7.5 billion. JAB will acquire Panera Bread for $315 per share in cash and will assume approximately $340 million of net debt. Panera Bread’s board of directors has unanimously approved the purchase agreement, which is expected to close in the third quarter of this year. “We strongly support Panera’s vision for the future, strategic initiatives, culture of innovation and balanced company versus franchise store mix,” says Olivier Goudet, partner and CEO of JAB. “We are excited to invest in, and work together with, Panera’s management team and franchisees to continue to lead the industry.” As of Dec. 27, 2016, there were 2,036 bakery-cafes in 46 states and in Ontario, Canada operating under the Panera Bread, Saint Louis Bread Co. or Paradise Bakery & Café names. Information about whether or not the transaction will affect Panera Bread’s restaurant locations was not disclosed. After 25 years operating as a publicly traded company, Panera Bread will become private and continue to be operated independently by its management team. Speaking to The …
The Chicagoland industrial market has started 2017 with a full head of steam and doesn’t appear ready to cool down anytime soon. With historically low vacancy rates, high net absorption and strong tenant demand, the outlook is positive for new construction in the pipeline, even with the recent uptick in interest rates. Net absorption of industrial space topped 19.3 million square feet in 2016, outpacing the 18.2 million square feet of new product delivered, according to CoStar Group. The metro Chicago vacancy rate at the end of the year was 6.5 percent, a drop of about 50 basis points over the previous 12 months. As for 2017, we see increasing competition for well-located land sites, especially from speculative developers who see opportunity in the rising demand for state-of-the-art facilities equipped for today’s sophisticated users. The jungle effect We have seen strong activity from tenants ranging from global logistics providers to regional distributors. However, a large share of the total net absorption in 2016 came from one well-known and much sought-after tenant — Amazon. The retailing giant has been leasing warehouse/distribution space at a rapid pace, and it seems as though every other week we are reading about a new distribution method, business …
EAST MOLINE, ILL. — Hall Structured Finance (HSF) has provided a $23.2 million loan for the construction of a Hyatt House and Hyatt Place hotel in East Moline, part of the Quad Cities region. This will be Hyatt’s first development of a blended, dual-flagged hotel, with a shared front desk and lobby amenities, and will serve as the company’s prototype for future dual-flagged developments. The nine-story, 233-room hotel will feature 134 upscale Hyatt Place rooms and 99 suite-style, extended-stay Hyatt House rooms. Olympia Hotel Management will operate the hotel. Great River LLC, in conjunction with the City of East Moline, plans to develop the 132-acre site of the former Case/International Harvester plant, where the hotel will be located, into a mixed-use development in two phases. The first phase consists of 42 acres and will include the new hotel, 324 multifamily units and a public park. Construction starts immediately and will be complete by summer 2018. In addition, two restaurants and four retail sites are expected to soon be under development.
ST. PAUL, MINN. — A new 134-unit apartment community, 333 on the Park, has opened in St. Paul. The eight-story building is located at 333 Sibley St. in the Lowertown neighborhood. Formerly known as the Gordon & Ferguson building, the building was constructed in 1913. Several players from the St. Paul Saints baseball team will live in the apartments. The team, part of the North Division of the American Association of Independent Professional Baseball, plays at nearby CHS Field. The building consists of studio, one-, two- and three-bedroom apartment homes, as well as 10 two-story penthouse homes. Two thousand square feet of commercial space located on the first floor is currently available for lease. Timberland Partners developed the apartment property, and will continue to own and manage the building. Kaas Wilson Architects designed the apartments, while Frana Cos. provided construction services for the renovation.
PEORIA, ILL. — Mid-America Real Estate Corp. has arranged the sale of Sheridan Village in Peoria for $13 million. The 310,094-square-foot shopping center is located at the intersection of Sheridan Road and Lake Avenue. The grocery-anchored center includes Hy-Vee, Bergner’s and Planet Fitness. Toronto, Canada-based Northbridge Investment Management purchased the center. Joe Girardi of Mid-America brokered the transaction on behalf of the seller, Cincinnati-based Viking Partners.
ROMULUS, MICH. — Burger & Co. has negotiated the lease of a 23,750-square-foot industrial building in Romulus, about 23 miles southwest of Detroit and five miles north of the Detroit Metropolitan Airport. The building is located on Cypress Road. Burger & Co. arranged the lease transaction on behalf of the landlord, D&G Construction. The tenant was not disclosed.
SHERRODSVILLE, OHIO — Vortech Contracting has signed a 7,100-square-foot industrial lease in Sherrodsville, located in eastern Ohio. The oil and gas services company will occupy the warehouse and office space on a three-acre site at 20 S. Church St. Bryce Custer of NAI Spring represented both Vortech Contracting and the undisclosed landlord in the lease transaction.
TOPEKA, KAN. — Payless ShoeSource has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and announced plans to immediately close nearly 400 underperforming stores. The company, which bills itself as the largest specialty family footwear retailer in the Western Hemisphere, currently operates approximately 4,400 stores in more than 30 countries. The shoes and accessory retailer was founded in 1956 in Topeka, Kan. “This is a difficult, but necessary, decision driven by the continued challenges of the retail environment, which will only intensify,” says W. Paul Jones, the company’s CEO. “We will build a stronger Payless.” Payless has entered into a Plan Support Agreement (PSA) with its lenders to reduce its debt load by almost 50 percent. The plan will also allow Payless to lower its annual cash interest costs, access additional capital and provide a path to emergence from Chapter 11 with a sustainable capital structure. The agreement will also allow Payless to invest in areas that may provide further growth, including omnichannel expansion, product and inventory initiatives, and international expansion in Latin America and elsewhere. The company plans to optimize its store footprint through the immediate store closures, as well as managing its existing real estate lease portfolio. This may include modifying …
MILWAUKEE — North Wells Capital, the investment management affiliate of Urban Innovations Ltd., has acquired a 428,652-square-foot mixed-use property in downtown Milwaukee for $25 million. The building is located at 331 W. Wisconsin Ave. in the Westown neighborhood. The building is home to Boston Store and its corporate offices, The Bon-Ton Stores Inc. and Boston Lofts apartments. The iconic building was constructed in the late 1800s. Boston Store, a department store, has occupied the building for nearly 100 years, with 123,434 square feet of retail space on the first and second floors. Bon-Ton’s corporate headquarters occupy 170,358 square feet on the third through fifth floors. Boston Lofts consists of 74 apartment units spanning 134,860 square feet on the top floors. Patrick Gallagher of CBRE represented the seller, WISPARK LLC. Urban Innovations will provide property management services for the building. The Mandel Group will continue to manage the Boston Lofts.
