Given his background in business development, Fred Schmidt, president and chief operating officer of Coldwell Banker Commercial Affiliates, is accustomed to analyzing real estate trends over his 36 years in the industry. Schmidt, who joined Madison, N.J.-based Coldwell Banker Commercial in 2003 as vice president of business development, is not nearly as surprised by the spate of retail store closures as some of his colleagues seem to be. REBusinessOnline.com sat down with Schmidt at the International Council of Shopping Center’s RECon event in Las Vegas in late May. In addition to discussing his firm’s push into retail markets in major cities, Schmidt shared his insights on how to repurpose malls. REBusinessOnline.com: Why are we seeing so many store closures and retail bankruptcies at this time? Fred Schmidt: It’s not a new discussion. It’s common knowledge that Class A malls are doing very well and that the discounters — the top end and bottom end — have been doing well over the years. But there was a prediction four or five years ago that the Class B and C malls were going to suffer because they didn’t have the right merchandising. These changes are now manifesting themselves in terms of the …
