Party City hires Excess Space to oversee site selections and lease renewals

Party City, which emerged from Chapter 11 in October, is moving forward with a program to secure its current portfolio of more than 750 locations across 45 states.

The Woodcliff Lake, N.J.-based chain has hired Excess Space Retail Services, a Newmark company, to oversee its site selection and lease renewal programs and optimize its national store footprint.

“We look forward to leveraging our history and experience in effective and diligent tenant representation to ensure that Party City is well-situated with strategically selected retail locations and favorable lease terms,” said Excess Space president Michael Wiener. “We look forward to leading these programs and continuing to deliver for this iconic brand.”

Party City’s long-range plan includes prioritizing efforts on innovation that drives traffic, strengthening digital and marketing presence, expanding and upgrading stores, and creating efficiencies across its enterprise. In its restructuring plan, the company closed approximately 60 stores, eliminating nearly $1 billion in debt.

Party City recently strengthened its capitalization through a restructuring that enhanced its liquidity with a $562 million new exit asset-based lending facility and a $75 million newly secured investment to fund go-forward operations and distributions. 

Last month, Party City announced a new store format that focuses on two of its key shopping categories: balloons and birthdays. The new design consists of two “birthday worlds,” one dedicated to kids’ birthdays and the other for general birthday celebrations. 

“Through our previous work together, ExcessSpace has demonstrated that they are best-in-class dealmakers who can provide expert-level market knowledge and lead strategic negotiations with the landlords of our national portfolio,” said Marc Ehle, Party City’s executive VP of enterprise operations.  “As we continue a period of long-term growth of the brand, we have no doubt that ExcessSpace is best suited to manage our real estate activity and ensure that we are able to uphold and expand our positioning as the premier celebrations provider.”

Party City is the largest vertically integrated designer, manufacturer, distributor, and retailer of party goods in North America.