Real Estate

The nation's largest discount retailer of perfumes and specialty celebrity and designer fragrances has filed for bankruptcy protection with a goal of moving its business forward — and closing more stores.    

With traditional anchors closing shop, malls nationwide are struggling to make themselves part of the entertainment business. None, however, are likely to do it as literally as Westfield’s Century City.  

Personalization is front and center in a new format from Roots.   The brand's new 5,000-sq.-ft. location, at Yorkdale Shopping Centre in Toronto, has a modern cabin-styled design and outdoorsy feel, with a different outdoor theme in every fitting room, reported the Financial Post.  

The Randall Park Mall outside of Cleveland was part of retail history in the mid-70’s when it debuted as “The World’s Biggest Mall.” Now the site becomes woven into the retail narrative of the 21st Century.  

Riverstone Capital Group has purchased the 43,199-sq.-ft. Shops at Lexington Circle in the Atlanta suburb of Peachtree City.   Anchored by a Sprouts Farmers Market and located on the West Highway 54 retail corridor, the property offered for sale by Mirabeland Investments and Concordia Properties was not on the market long, according to the deal’s broker.  

Sears Holdings Corp.'s second-quarter earnings beat the Street as it benefitted from cost-saving initiatives. But it continued to struggle with weak traffic and declining sales, and added 28 more locations to its long list of store closings.    Sears reported that its second-quarter loss narrowed to $251 million, or $2.34 per share, in the quarter ended July 29, helped by cost savings resulting from the streamlining of operations and store closings.  

Chains close stores, and chains open stores. Legendary cataloger and online retailer L.L. Bean is one of the latter, opening its 33rd store outside of Maine and its fourth in the state of Virginia.   This week’s debut came at The Shops at Stonefield, a 265,000-sq.-ft. lifestyle center in Charlottesville that was acquired by O’Connor Capital Partners last year.  

An 11-year veteran of Canadian department store giant HBC is stepping down.    HBC, whose banners include Hudson's Bay, Saks Fifth Avenue, and Lord & Taylor, announced that Don Watros, president of HBC International, has made the decision to leave, effective September 29, 2017. The company did not name a successor.