Corporate Governance

Los Angeles — CBRE Group has acquired the commercial real estate brokerage, investment property sales and property management services business of The Furman Co. and certain of its affiliates. Those business lines have served as CBRE’s affiliate in South Carolina, and have operated under the banner of CBRE|Furman since 2010.

New York — Covo Trattoria has leased restaurant space at 3660 Broadway at the intersection with West 151st Street, a prominent corner in the Hamilton Heights district of Upper Manhattan. The space includes 1,500 sq. ft. on the ground floor and a full basement. Covo Trattoria anticipates opening in the spring.

The eatery has two existing locations in West Harem. At the Hamilton Heights location, Covo Trattoria will join neighbors The Grange, The Chipped Cup, Harlem Public and The Heights Tavern.

Atlanta – The Home Depot has acquired Houston-based window coverings retailer Blinds.com. As The Home Depot continues to implement its interconnected retail strategy, the company will work with Blinds.com to expand its technology into Homedepot.com and the company's stores with the goal of improving the entire end-to-end buying process for window coverings.

The Blinds.com management team and staff will remain intact at its headquarters in Houston. The acquisition closed Jan. 23 and terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Atlanta -- Global Payments Inc. will acquire Payment Processing, Inc. (PayPros). PayPros, based in California, is a provider of fully-integrated payment solutions for 58,000 small-to-medium sized retailers in the U.S.  

Cary, N.C. – The Pantry has confirmed that JCP Investment Management, LLC, and Lone Star Value Management, LLC (“the dissident group”) submitted a notice of intent to nominate director candidates to stand for election to The Pantry’s board of directors at the company's 2014 annual meeting of stockholders.

New York -- The Deloitte Consumer Spending Index, which tracks consumer cash flow as an indicator of future consumer spending, rose in December 2013. The Index, which comprises four components, tax burden, initial unemployment claims, real wages and real home prices, increased to 4.3 in December from 3.9 the prior month.

Washington, D.C. – The FBI has reportedly issued a confidential report to U.S. retailers warning that more cyber attacks like the ones recently suffered by Target and Neiman Marcus will occur. According to Reuters, the three-page report was distributed Jan. 17 and informs retailers that the FBI has discovered in the past year there have been at least 20 attacks using the same type of malware used against Target.

Seattle – Starbucks Corporation’s profit in the first quarter rose 25% to $540.7 million from $432 million in the year-ago period, better than analysts expected.

Revenue for the quarter ended Dec. 29, 2013 rose 12% to $4.24 billion from $3.79 billion. Same-store sales rose 5%, beneath Wall Street expectations of 5.9%.

Same-store sales in the Americas region also rose 5%, while analysts had expected a 6.4% increase.

Levi Strauss & Co. has named Craig Nomura as EVP and president of global retail, effective Feb. 3. He will report to president and CEO Chip Bergh.

The Home Depot has acquired Blinds.com, the Houston-based online window coverings retailer.

In explaining the appeal of the partnership, Home Depot cited Blinds.com's integrated user experience, on-demand staff and knowledge base.