Welco News

NOV 11, 2011 11:57 AM, STAFF REPORTS

Prestige Properties will develop The Mall at Bay Plaza, a $270 million, 780,000-sq.-ft. fashion mall in the Bronx. The mall will be located on a corner parcel at Prestige-owned Bay Plaza Shopping Center and will use an existing JC Penney as one of its anchors. A 160,000-sq.-ft. Macy’s will serve as the second anchor. The property will also feature a 1,800-car parking garage.

The developer plans to break ground on the project in the spring of 2012, with opening scheduled for late 2013/early 2014.

“We have had excellent success at Bay Plaza since its inception, and we are pleased and excited to bring this best-in-class, enclosed fashion mall to our community and the Bronx,” said Prestige Properties CEO and Chairman Sam Shalem in a statement. “We thank Mayor Bloomberg, Bronx Borough President Diaz and the people of the Bronx for their continued support and patronage.”

Jerry Welkis and Allen Cooperman, of Welco Realty, will handle the leasing efforts for Bay Plaza on behalf of Prestige Properties.

The project will create more than 2,000 construction jobs and more than 1,700 permanent jobs.

http://retailtrafficmag.com/news/prestige_build_mall_Bronx_11112011/

New Rochelle, New York, September 16, 2011 - Welco Realty, Inc. is pleased to announce that it has arranged a lease representing Pier 1 Imports in the following location:

   - Rego Center, Queens, NY – 8,500 sf

Welco Realty represented both the landlord and the tenant in the following two locations:

   - Bay Plaza Shopping Center, Bronx, NY – 9,599 sf

   - Summerhill Square, East Brunswick, New Jersey – 9,000 sf

July 28, 2011 - Welco Realty, Inc. is pleased to announce that it has arranged a lease representing TJX Companies for a new Marshalls store in The Boulder Run Shopping Center in Wyckoff, New Jersey.

July 22, 2011 - Welco Realty, Inc. is pleased to announce that it has signed a lease representing T J X Companies on a new Home Goods store in the Veteran’s Square Town Center in Lyndhurst, New Jersey. The shopping center is anchored by ShopRite supermarket.

As seen in The Record, July 3, 2011. Click here.

For most of the 1990s and 2000s, the mantra of the nation’s major retail chains was, "Supersize my store." Now, retail landlords and real estate brokers are hearing a different refrain: "Do you have anything smaller?"

Some of the same retailers who built their businesses with big boxes — stores of 40,000, 60,000, or in the case of Wal-Mart Stores Inc., 100,000 square feet of selling space — have decided that smaller is better. That’s a trend with big implications for North Jersey shopping centers, malls and developers.

Landlords are subdividing superstores, and reinventing their shopping centers to respond to the trend. "As tenants reduce their footprints, [landlords] are going to need more tenants. And that means they need to have a broader-based shopping environment," said Glenn Brill, a managing director in the Real Estate Solutions practice of FTI Consulting, who has worked on a number of New Jersey retail developments.

Power centers — freestanding large stores that house chains such as Staples Inc., Best Buy Co. and Home Depot Inc., ringed around a common parking lot — were developers’ pet projects before the recession. Now, community centers, better known as strip malls in North Jersey, are the favorite retail configuration, because they have more options for small and mid-sized stores.

"The sweet spot now for the medium-size boxes is in the 10,000- to 20,000-square-foot range," said Chuck Lanyard, president of The Goldstein Group, a retail brokerage firm based in Paramus. "We’re going to see smaller and smaller stores, and that’s probably going to be the wave of the future."

Three factors are driving the downsizing trend, retail analysts and brokers said. First, retailers need to increase their sales per square foot in a rough economy. Second, the Internet is changing the way people shop, and pushing retailers to increase profit margins at their brick-and-mortar stores. Third, shoppers, particularly aging baby boomers, are tired of schlepping through superstores.

Major retailers who are creating smaller-format stores, some of them in North Jersey, include:

Best Buy — planning to shrink its stores to 36,000 square feet, down from the current average of 45,000, in part by subleasing space to other retailers.

Walmart — building 7-Eleven-size Walmart Express stores; seeking sites in North Jersey for its 45,000-square-foot Neighborhood Markets.

Staples — now considers 15,000 square feet the ideal size, down from 22,000.

Office Depot — cut its Route 17 Paramus store in half and leased the spare half to Trader Joe's.

Gap —remodeling its store at Westfield Garden State Plaza in Paramus to occupy a smaller space.

Modell's — has opened stores in Ramsey and Manhattan that are about half the size of their older stores.

Target — will launch a smaller store prototype in 11 cities in 2012.

Sears —subdivided some of its stores, sharing space with co-tenants like Forever 21.

"In retail, one of your key measures of productivity is sales per square foot. What’s been happening in the big-box stores is that number has been pretty stagnant, and possibly even going down," said James Dion, president of Dionco Inc., a retail consulting firm based in Chicago. Retailers’ corporate reports and retail analysts have been documenting that trend since the recession hit.

In recent years, Dion said, Best Buy, Wal-Mart and other large chains have been suffering price deflation that has hurt sales per square foot. "A 42-inch plasma TV that five years ago they were selling for $5,000 is being sold for $600, so their sales per square foot are definitely going to take a hit," he said. "You have to stand back as a merchant and say, ‘I pay for every square foot I have, so clearly the smaller the footprint, the more productive I am.’ "

The Apple stores are the stellar example of being highly productive in a small space. Apple stores, Dion said, at an average size of 6,000 square feet, have sales of almost $6,000 per square foot of selling space, compared with $300 for Wal-Mart, $895 for Best Buy and less than $200 for most department stores.

Consumers today want stores to "edit" or limit the choices, rather than overwhelm them with dozens of options for each product category, Dion said. "We know [from studies] that when customers are confronted with too much choice, they don’t make a choice," he said.

The ease of Internet shopping also has made consumers less patient with hard-to-shop superstores. "We have made online so easy to shop," Dion said, "and yet brick and mortar has really fallen behind," he said. "The big boxes in particular are struggling with the navigation concept. How do I make my store as easy to navigate as my website?"

As online sales become a bigger source of revenue for retailers, large superstores are becoming less important, Brill said. Retailers "are going to demand higher margins from their stores, and they’re only going to want to have high-performing stores. You start to think about having fewer stores, and the stores you do have you expect their margins to be not dissimilar from the margins you’re getting on the Internet." Those margins vary with each retailer, but online sales obviously require less overhead than a brick-and-mortar store, Brill said.

Jerry Welkis, president of Welco Realty, and a member of X Team International, a consortium of retail brokerage firms, represents a number of North Jersey landlords, as well as retailers looking for spaces. These days, the top thought in retailers’ minds is, "How can we get more productivity — do the same kind of sales volume in a smaller space — and make more money for the bottom line," he said. As part of that trend, he has seen retailers such as shoe discounter DSW switch from favoring 30,000- to 35,000-square-foot stores to 17,000- to 19,000-square-foot spaces, and office supply chain Staples downsize to 15,000 square feet from a 20,000- to 22,000-square-foot format.

In some cases, Welkis said, retailers are developing smaller-store formats in order to have more flexibility to go into new locations. Sporting-goods chain Modell’s recently opened a store in the Interstate Shopping Center in Ramsey that at 8,900 square feet is about half the size of its typical stores. Toys "R" Us, he said, has three size formats for its new combined Toys and Babies "R" Us stores — 30,000 square feet, 45,000 square feet and 60,000 to 70,000 square feet.

Welkis said retailers are increasingly realizing that one size doesn’t fit all markets. Paramus, which generates high sales per square foot, will continue to have more large-size stores than smaller and less-affluent markets, he said.

But even in Paramus, "retailers want to get more productivity out of their stores and where they feel they can downsize and not sacrifice volume, they’re going to do that," Welkis said.

Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. Chief Executive Officer Steven Temares, in an interview at the company’s recent annual meeting, said finding the right size for the market is more important than jumping on the downsizing trend.

"We always have sized the store for the market," he said. "So we’ve had 18,000-square-foot stores and stores in excess of 100,000 square feet. New Jersey, where there’s great density, good income, generally speaking supports a larger store. In Vineland, we have a smaller store than we have in Paramus, for example, but we love them both."

E-mail: verdon@northjersey.com

Daffy's Welco Realty, Inc., an X Team partner, announced today that Daffy’s opened its first store in Bronx, New York. One of New York’s major discount apparel retailer chain opened its first store in Bay Plaza Shopping Center, one of the largest strip shopping centers in New York city . Welco Realty negotiated the deal on behalf of the landlord, Prestige Properties & Development Co. Bay Plaza is over one million sf shopping center that has grown over the last twenty years to include such notable tenants such as Barnes & Noble, JCPenney, Old Navy, Marshall’s, P.C. Richards, Kmart, Modell’s, AMC Theatres, Staples, Toys R Us, Babies R Us and many more national & regional chains. The inclusion of Daffy’s coming into Bay Plaza and the recent opening of other apparel retailers such as Children’s Place and Carter’s will just improve the existing apparel mix in the shopping center.

Welco Realty, Inc., an X Team partner, announced today that it has signed a lease representing Jo-Ann Fabric and Craft Stores for 30,000 sf. for a flagship store in the former Comp USA space on Route 17, Paramus, New Jersey. This store will be one of the largest format stores for Jo-Ann Fabric and Craft Stores, its first store in the Paramus market. Jo-Ann Fabric and Craft Stores is also expected to draw from the metropolitan New York area as well as New Jersey because of its close proximity to New York.

Welco Realty, Inc., an X Team partner, announced today that it has signed a lease with Modell’s Sporting Goods for their new smaller concept store. The first one that they have opened in New Jersey at the Interstate Shopping Center, Route 17, Ramsey. This store is approximately 8,551 s.f., which is approximately half the size of their standard store. The first store that they opened under this format was in Amsterdam Avenue in Manhattan.

For more information, contact Mr. Jerry Welkis at jwelkis@welcorealty.com.

As seen in the Mid Atlantic RE Journal Year in Review Dec. 2010. Click here.

Paramus, NJ – Welco Realty, Inc. has leased space at Paramus Towne Square. XSRE leased 20,000 s.f. of the former Circuit City space. Marshalls Shoe Megashop has leased 10,000 s.f., which will be their second Shoe Megashop in New Jersey.

Paramus Towne Square is one of the premier shopping centers on Route 17 in Paramus. Only one end cap space remaining in the center, 21,000 s.f., which can possibly be divided. Other tenants in the center include Michael’s, Buy Buy Baby, Golfsmith, Chef Central, Dick’s Sporting Goods and Ramsey Outdoor.

Welco Realty signed leases in Summer Hill Square, a new 157,000 s.f. center development on Route 18, East Brunswick. Annie Sez signed 11,000 s.f. David’s Bridal signed 10,000 s.f. Other tenants include Babies/Toys R Us, Men’s Wearhouse & Moe’s Suthwest Grill. There are a few stores still available.

North Bergen, NJ - Burlington Coat Factory, a national retail chain offering current, high quality, designer merchandise at competitive prices, will open a 70,320 square foot store in Tonnelle Plaza Shopping Center on November 12. Tonnelle Plaza Shopping Center is owned by developer Hartz Mountain Industries. This new store will be the first in North Bergen, the twenty sixth in New Jersey, and will serve as Tonnelle Plaza's anchor store. Burlington shoppers will benefit with everyday savings of up to 70 percent off department store prices. In addition, Burlington will employ approximately 75 area residents in sales and management positions. "The new Burlington will appeal not only to local shoppers by providing a unique shopping experience for the entire family, but the local community will also benefit," says Thomas Kingsbury, President and CEO of Burlington Coat Factory. "We are thrilled to bring jobs to North Bergen with the opening of this new store." The North Bergen store will feature a wide variety of the latest trends in ladies' dresses, suits, sportswear, maternity and accessories; top name men's suits and sportswear; quality, name brand shoes for men, women and children; famous label clothes for kids of all ages, and of course – coats - the largest selection of coats in the nation with more than 5,000 to choose from. "The addition of Burlington Coat Factory is mutually beneficial to both the shopping center and Burlington," said Emanuel Stern, president and chief operating officer of Hartz Mountain Industries. "The Tonnelle Plaza location provides Burlington access to their core demographic, while Burlington's reputable name will draw many more patrons to the shopping center, benefiting the stores and services already present." Jerry Welkis, president of Welco Realty Inc., represents Tonnelle Plaza on behalf of Hartz. "The addition of Burlington Coat Factory will ensure present and potential tenants a continuous flow of shoppers. Two units of 7,238 s.f. and 5,200 s.f. remain available. Once Burlington is open, I expect both spaces to be leased quickly."

For more information, contact Mr. Jerry Welkis at jwelkis@welcorealty.com

Empty stores in November are a retail landlord's nightmare before Christmas. However, in North Jersey the retail leasing landscape is less scary this year than it was a year ago.

Welco Realty just announced a deal to lease half the 40,000-square-foot Circuit City store in Paramus Towne Square on Route 17 to XSRE, a fashion accessory retailer.

Real estate brokers and property managers said an increase in leasing activity in recent months is absorbing a significant amount of the empty square footage that pushed North Jersey retail vacancy rates to their highest level in more than a decade.

A string of retail bankruptcies and store closings lifted the retail vacancy rate for northern and central New Jersey to 8.18 percent in July 2009 from 5.21 percent a year earlier. This past July, the rate remained about the same, at 8.16 percent, according to the annual survey by The Goldstein Group, a brokerage firm based in Paramus. The vacancy rate on Route 17 in Paramus, the prime retail corridor in the state, was 10 percent in July, down from 11.5 percent a year earlier. The vacancy rate measures only empty stores along highways, not in downtowns or enclosed malls.

Landlords have gotten creative in filling their spaces in the face of a surplus of vacant stores. Emil Geering, owner of the Tower Records store on Route 17 in Paramus, found an unusual new tenant in Goodwill Industries.

In recent months, some of the shuttered big-box stores that contributed to that rate have been leased, or are close to landing tenants, as retailers are deciding that the time is right to make a deal.

"The feeling is not that things are necessarily going to get better, but that things are going to stay the same. So the rents aren't going any lower and yet retailers can make money with the deals they still can make with a landlord," said Chuck Lanyard, president of The Goldstein Group. Retailers are starting to think they should make deals now, rather than wait and lose good opportunities, he said. Last year, Lanyard said, retailers still had the attitude that "there was no rush, because whatever I'm looking for will be around." Now, he said, retailers are seeing spaces being leased "so they figure hey, I better get back out there now. The deals are still really good but the inventory is shrinking."

Oversized stores

Landlords and real estate brokers have found creative ways to fill some of the big-box stores in Paramus that emptied out during the recession, but some long-term unleased properties remain among the repurposed ones.

Creative re-leasing:

Former Circuit City store at 240 Route 17 north in Paramus Towne Square, divided into 20,000-square-foot XSRE fashion accessory store and other spaces.

Former 14,000-square-foot Tower Records at 809 Route 17 north leased to Goodwill.

Former 120,000-square-foot Levitz Furniture store at 545 Route 17 south divided into 40,000-square-foot Ashley Furniture store and three other spaces.

The long-term unleased:

Seaman/Levitz store, 55 Route 4; 22,364 square feet

Fortunoff store, 150 Route 17 north; 40,000 square feet

Home Depot Expo store, 577 Winters Ave.; 90,000 square feet

Circuit City site

Welco Realty just announced a deal to lease half the 40,000-square-foot Circuit City store in Paramus Towne Square on Route 17 to XSRE, a fashion accessory retailer. Welco President Jerry Welkis said he is negotiating with other retailers for the remainder of the space. Circuit City filed for bankruptcy in 2008 and began closing its stores the following year. The XSRE store is scheduled to open next spring.

Welkis' company also recently brokered a deal to bring a 10,000-square-foot Marshalls Shoe Megashop to Paramus Towne Square, the second Marshalls shoe store in New Jersey.

Still, some leftovers from the wave of bankruptcies that rocked the retail world in 2008 still remain, including a former Linens 'n Things store in the Totowa Square shopping center on Route 46.

Even Paramus, one of the most sought retail addresses in New Jersey and on the East Coast, has several large properties that fall in the category of long-term unleased — vacant for two Christmases or more. But those properties tend to have disadvantages such as limited parking or less-than-ideal access from the highway that make them more difficult to re-lease.

The former Seaman's/Levitz store on Route 4 in Paramus has been without a permanent tenant for close to four years, although it has had several temporary tenants during that time, including most recently a Spirit Halloween store. That 22,000-square-foot space has a problem typical of vacant furniture stores — lots of space inside to display furniture, but not much parking space outside, because furniture stores usually have a small number of customers at any one time.

Another property that presents a leasing challenge is the 90,000-square-foot Home Depot Expo store on Winters Avenue, just off Route 17 in Paramus. The Expo store, an experiment in upscale design by Home Depot, has been vacant for 18 months, and its large size and location off the highway make it a tougher sell.

The Expo store, which opened in 2001, was a product of a building boom in retail, when bigger was considered better. Now landlords are learning that they have to be willing to divide their big-box spaces into smaller stores to land tenants.

Landlord creativity

Jeremy Isaacs of Ripco Real Estate, the brokerage firm for the Expo building, said dividing that space could be a possibility. "We are looking at all options" and working on new uses for the building, he said.

Over the past year, landlords have gotten creative in filling their spaces in the face of a surplus of vacant stores. Emil Geering, owner of the 14,000-square-foot Tower Records store on Route 17 in Paramus found an unusual new tenant in Goodwill Industries, which opened a thrift store there in July. ARC Properties Inc. of Clifton divided the 120,000-square-foot former Levitz site on Route 17 into four stores to give new tenants, in effect, a "cut to fit" space.

Lanyard said some of the most sought-after spaces are in the 10,000-square-foot-and-under range. Welkis said he is seeing a lot of interest in spaces suitable for food franchises, such as Five Guys or Smashburger. "We get a zillion calls for spaces in the 2,000-, 2,500-, 3,000-square-foot category, but we're also getting calls for 10,000, 12,000, 20,000 square feet." Welkis said. "It really depends on the retailer. The one commonality is everybody's trying to squeeze" — take the least possible amount of space for a viable store in order to maximize profits.

Fashion component

Welkis said the Marshalls Shoe Megashop and XSRE stores will bring a needed fashion component to Paramus Towne Square, and be complementary tenants for BuyBuy Baby, Chef Central and the center's other retailers. "They will bring a little more fashion to the center. That was one of the objectives we had," he said. "Women drive the sales of shopping centers, so the more retailers we can bring in that will bring the women in the better."

XSRE, a new chain, also is opening stores on Long Island and at the Palisades Center mall in West Nyack, N.Y.

Paramus Towne Square was hit by two big-box closings — Circuit City and Linens 'n Things — after those retailers folded. The 60,000-square-foot Linens store was quickly re-leased to Dick's Sporting Goods, which opened there this spring.

In addition to deals with new tenants, lease renewals by existing tenants have been an encouraging sign of an improving climate, said Matthew Harding, president and chief operating officer of Levin Management, a property brokerage and management firm based in Plainfield. Levin Management oversees more than 12 million square feet of retail space in New Jersey and five other states. Its North Jersey properties include the Paramus Place center anchored by Kohl's on Route 4 in Paramus and centers in Clifton and Edgewater.

Renewals 'strong'

"We're seeing pretty strong renewals and extensions of leases, which is a very important component to maintaining occupancy and the general health of the market," Harding said.

While the market has stabilized in recent months, "it's a little bit of a delicate balance still," Harding said. "There are tenants out there looking for space, but they have a lot of choices these days. They're really looking to get into the top-flight Class A retail properties," he said.

As a result, his company is "doing a number of renovations now to keep our properties at the top of the market," including a project at a shopping center at Route 46 and Van Houten Avenue in Clifton.

North Jersey's retail vacancy rate of 8 percent still is significantly lower than the national average of 15 percent, Lanyard said. "If we're averaging 15 percent nationally, and only 8 percent in Jersey — it means in a way we're almost in a tight market," he said.

http://www.northjersey.com/news/107870314_A_retailing_thaw.html

New Rochelle, New York, October 26, 2010 — Welco Realty, Inc., an X Team partner, announced today that it has leased two spaces in Paramus, New Jersey. One to XSRE & the other to Marshalls Shoe Megashop. 1) XSRE, a new woman’s accessories store concept – leased 20,000 sq. ft. of the former Circuit City space. 2) Marshalls Shoe Megashop – leased 10,000 sq.ft., which will be their second Shoe Megashop in New Jersey. (www.marshallsonline.com)

Paramus Towne Square is one of the premier shopping centers on Rt. 17 in Paramus, which unfortunately got hit with two major tenant closings due to bankruptcy. A 60,000 sq.ft. Linens & Things & a 41,000 sq.ft. Circuit City. Through Welco’s leasing efforts we were able to lease the former 60,000 sq.ft. Linens & Things to Dick’s Sporting Goods and half of the former Circuit City box was just leased to XSRE, a new woman’s accessories store concept. Only one end cap space remaining in the center, 21,000 sq.ft., which can possibly be divided. Other tenants in the center include Michael’s, Buy Buy Baby, Golfsmith, Chef Central, Dick’s Sporting Goods and Ramsey Outdoor.

The other two leases signed were in Summer Hill Square, a new 157,000 sq.ft center development on Rt. 18, East Brunswick, New Jersey. 1) Annie Sez 11,000 sq.ft. 2) David’s Bridal - 10,000 sq.ft. Other tenants include Babies / Toys R Us, Men’s Wearhouse & Moe’s Southwest Grill. There are a few stores still available.

New Rochelle, New York, August 5, 2010 — Welco Realty, Inc., an X Team partner, announced today that it has leased five locations.

1) Daffy’s – Bay Plaza Shopping Center, Bronx, New York. One of New York’s major discount apparel retailer chain to open its first store in Bay Plaza in the Bronx. 28,000 sf – a portion of the existing Linens & Things. Bay Plaza is over 1 million sf shopping center that has grown over the last twenty years to include such notable tenants such as Barnes & Noble, JCPenney, Old Navy, Marshall’s, P.C. Richards, Kmart, Modell’s, AMC Theatres, Staples, Toys R Us, Babies R Us and many more. The inclusion of Daffy’s coming into Bay Plaza and other apparel retailers such as Children’s Place and Carter’s will just improve the existing apparel mix in the shopping center.

2) Burlington Coat Factory – Tonnelle Plaza, North Bergen, New Jersey (74,000 sf) Burlington Coat to take over former National Wholesale Liquidators store and to co-anchor the Shopping Center with A.J.Wright

3) Children’s Place – Bay Plaza Shopping Center, Bronx, New York (5,000 sf). Children’s Place to take over a former Ponderosa Restaurant.

4) Carter’s – Hylan Commons, Staten Island, New York (4,800 sf). Carter’s to join such premier tenants such as Gap, T.J.Maxx, Annie Sez, Justice, The Avenue, Starbucks, etc.

5) Party City – Harriman, New York (13,000 sf)

Posted on June 10th, 2010 in Current Issue of The Dealmakers, Dealmakers - Everything Retail Real Estate

Profile — A monthly column featuring retailers and retail real estate companies

Welco Realty, Inc. is a real estate consulting and brokerage firm offering market analysis, site selection, demographics, competition evaluation and lease negotiation services for retail clients, as well as landlord and shopping center representation. The company has leased millions of square feet of retail space in shopping centers and central business districts throughout CT, NJ, NY and PA, representing both landlords and tenants, and has done it all with an insider’s perspective – the product of its key executives’ strong background in retail prior to forming the company. Principal Jerry Welkis handled operations along the East Coast and eventually an expansion program throughout the northeastern U.S. for Baskin Robbins, and also served as head of real estate in the U.S. for Consumers Catalog Showroom. Principal David Sternschuss served as head of real estate for Lane Bryant for 12 years, as well as assisting general counsel for Bloomingdale’s, and principal Allen Cooperman served with Federated Department Stores and Shopco Development Co. Welco’s business initially focused on tenant representation because of this retailer-oriented past; eventually, the company moved into landlord representation as well, as developers came to Welco requesting help leasing their centers. The company also invests in properties itself on a small level.

“We found that diversification for us as a company is good,” Welkis said. “In times when retailers are doing great and they can’t get enough locations, the retail tenant rep side of our business brings in a lot of revenue. When retailers are not doing well, our landlords find they need us even more because they find it tough to lease and market space, and are looking for people with the relationships, expertise and marketing capability we have.” Over the past year or so, he said, the landlord representation aspect of the business had been much more successful than tenant representation, but within the past several months retailers have been “kicking the tires” and looking to do deals. “I think retailers are seeing some good signs of the economy recovering, and are now taking advantage of some of the reduced rents that might be out there in markets [they] want to get into,” he added.

The recession has had some impact on occupancy at shopping centers the company handles, Welkis said, estimating that lease rates have been reduced by about 10 to 20% overall as retailers – particularly big-box tenants such as Circuit City or Linens ‘N Things – have gone out of business. However, Welco has weathered this and other troubled economic times by remaining “lean and mean” and resisting the urge to overexpand. “During the good times, we were able to service our clients well, but not operate so extravagantly that we had to have a certain amount of income to cover our overheads,” he said. “In the tough times, because we were lean, our cost was in proper ratio to our income.” Also, the loss of some tenants afforded the company the chance to re-merchandise and upgrade the tenancy of centers that had previously lacked available space.

As a tenant representative, Welco tries to function as though it were the client’s in-house real estate department. This entails observing potential sites on weekdays and weekends, talking to other retailers at the site, and generally making sure that the deal is one they would make for themselves, as though it were their company looking at the space. Welco also tries to involve itself in short- and long-term goals for their retail clients, offering input not just regarding real estate, but distribution, advertising within the market in question and other aspects of the business. “I wore several hats with different retail companies,” Welkis said, “and I think that the retailers have a certain respect for us; they know we’ve been in their shoes before. When we look at a site, we look at the company as a whole. We’re not just salespeople; we’re not just trying to lease a space and get a commission. We believe in long-term relationships, and we want the retailer to be successful so that he grows, and grows with us.”

On the opposite side of the business, the company specializes in the handling of difficult leasing projects, and Welkis sited as an example the demalling of Mill Creek Mall, located in Secaucus, NJ, which reopened as a specialty center last year. Initially a 400,000 sq.ft. enclosed mall anchored by a Kohl’s and a supermarket on opposite sides of the structure, the center was having difficulty contending with new major shopping centers opening nearby, and sales had begun to suffer. Welco arranged the buyout or termination of leases at the mall, coordinated the departure of the mall tenants and tore down everything apart from the anchors in order to recreate the mall as a specialty center. New tenants were brought in, including a Toys “R” Us/Babies “R” Us superstore, The Sports Authority, T.J. Maxx, and a Bob’s Furniture that signed recently. “We made lemonade out of lemons,” Welkis said of the project. “It was very difficult because of all the nuances of working with the tenants, and demalling, and convincing big-box retailers that this was a place to be. We created a major retail development in Secaucus; we took a mall that was antiquated and declining, and made a very successful specialty center.”

Current projects for Welco include a 70,000 sq.ft. to 80,000 sq.ft. expansion underway at Summer Hills Shopping Center, located in East Brunswick, NJ. The first phase of the Toys “R” Us/Babies “R” Us-anchored center opened last year, and the expansion, which is slated to include apparel retailers, a sporting goods chain and numerous restaurants, will open during 2011. Welco is also redeveloping a former Loehmann’s-anchored shopping center in Florham Park, NJ. Tenants at the center will include dressbarn and a recently-signed Trader Joe’s. Other projects include a new 100,000 sq.ft. center in Hawthorne, NJ; an expansion of Commerce Plaza in North Brunswick, NJ to feature BJ’s Wholesale Club, and Edison Town Center, a new development with Sam’s Club slated to open as its first tenant.

Most companies have had to revisit the way they approach new opportunities in the past few years, and Welco is no exception. Welkis cited the company’s work with pop-up stores as a creative and beneficial new undertaking, as they allow Welco’s retailer clients to enter into locations on a short-term basis with very little capital expenditure as a means of testing a market. “Retailers in this economy want to take advantage of having a lot more available space in areas that wouldn’t normally have space for them,” he said. “They can go into a market and test it, and not lock themselves in…if the store does well, it gives [the retailer] the comfort level to enter into a longer-term lease.” Also, in cases where centers have large vacancies and are having trouble filling them, the company will often try to enter into short-term leases with pop-up retailers to provide a temporary solution. “It can be a win-win for the landlord and the tenants,” he explained. “It’s a live body in the store, bringing traffic to the center.”

The company has handled temporary leases for companies such as Nine West and Halloween USA, and was recently named master broker throughout the northeastern U.S. for Toys “R” Us Express, Toys “R” Us’ pop-up store program. The company’s area of coverage stretches from the Baltimore and Washington, DC area through New England. Welco is able to address this wider area of coverage thanks to their affiliation with the X-Team, a nationwide, 30-office organization of retail brokers that assist one another with clients and share information, technology and support. “If we didn’t have a relationship with X-Team, it’d be difficult for us to handle that wide an area,” Welkis said. “Our area of dominance is primarily CT, NJ and NY.”

The Toys “R” Us Express stores typically occupy spaces of 5,000 sq.ft. but can range in size from 3,000 sq.ft. to over 10,000 sq.ft., and suitable locations are either vacant or soon to be vacant, and require no tenant improvements. “We have to be somewhat opportunistic, because obviously we need to get these stores open very quickly, and in a very short period of time,” Welkis said. The benefits for Welco in handling these types of deals are numerous, he explained. The company is able to associate itself with major brands with strong reputations, but short-term lease deals also allow them to establish a relationship with landlords for future projects, should the same center that brought in a pop-up store have other vacancies to fill. Also, he added, short-term leases often lead to other deals the company never would’ve made otherwise. “As we’re looking for locations for these tenants, we’re coming up with sites for other retailers on permanent deals that offshoot from that,” he said. “It gives us a lot of exposure, both on the retail side and on the developer side.”

For more information, contact Jerry Welkis, Welco Realty, Inc., 2525 Palmer Avenue, New Rochelle, NY 10801; 914-576-7500, Fax 914-576-7596; Web site: www.welcorealty.com.

Jerry Welkis, founder and president of Welco Realty Inc., has steadfastly stuck with retail since emerging from New York's Fashion Institute of Technology in the 1970's with his Buying and Merchandising degree in hand. Welkis, 58, whose venerable New Rochelle, NY-based firm represents retailers, landlords and shopping centers, says he can't imagine working in any other field. "Creativity has always driven me, and retail is so much more creative and exciting than the rest of real estate," said Welkis. "When you build a shopping center from the ground up and bring in tenants that people really love, you are serving a need in the community and creating jobs. You feel like you're achieving something and bettering the world."

The New York native's lengthy curriculum vitae reads like a "Who's Who" of American retailers. His tenant-rep clients include such top performers as AMC Theatres, J.C. Penney, Pier 1 , Party City, Elizabeth Arden, Hobby Lobby, Darden Restaurants, Toys R Us, TJ Maxx, Marshalls, 24-Hour Fitness, Dress Barn, Mandees/Annie Sez and many more.

Upon graduation, Welkis answered a blind ad and got a job with Baskin-Robbins. "They were in a major real estate expansion and needed someone to go around and open stores in malls and secondary locations," Welkis said. "I'd hire someone to manage them, then find a franchisee." Welkis was soon bumped up to Northeast U.S. regional manager during his five-year Baskin-Robbins stint before departing for Fayva shoes, where, as real estate manager for metro New York, he helped build Fayva into a 1,000-store chain. From Fayva, he moved on to a real estate position at Consumers Distributing Company, a Toronto-based catalogue showroom retailer with sales in excess of $1 billion, and later rose to vice president of real estate development and construction for the U.S. division.

Growing dissatisfied with the constrictions of corporate retail, Welkis struck out on his own in the mid-1980s, at a time when very few retailers were outsourcing real estate functions. As a retail real estate consultant, an ambitious young Welkis managed to enlist Mandees and R & S Strauss on one-year retainers. Word of his skills spread, and other signings ensued, including Nine West, Lechters and plus-size clothier Modern Woman.

The successes prompted Welkis to form Welco Realty as an exclusive retail tenant representation firm.

Flash forward to the present, and Welkis' team has leased millions of square feet of shopping center and CBD retail space over a 20 year-plus history, primarily in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Pennsylvania. Welkis estimates his business is about 45% tenant rep, 45% landlord rep and 10% development. On the landlord side, Welco has represented prominent developers RREEF, Hartz Mountain Industries, TREECO, and Prestige Properties and Development Company. Welco also represents a well-known portfolio of centers, including: City Place in Edgewater, New Jersey, a major lifestyle center overlooking the Hudson River; Glendale/ Forest Hills Shopping Center in Queens; Harmon Meadow Plaza in Secaucus, New Jersey, a major multi-million-square-foot, multi-use retail, hotel and office development; Bay Plaza in the Bronx, one of the largest shopping centers in the outer boroughs of New York; and, the Plainview Shopping Center on Long Island.

After more than 35 years in the business, Welkis still enjoys working through the widely varied components of the retail equation, from site-research to tenant-mix evaluations to meetings with marketers, architects and designers. "And I still love to get a store or a shopping center opened and see the customers coming and the registers ringing," he said. "It's a win-win for everyone – the landlord, the tenant and the community – if you do it right.”

Tenants and landlords both faced a tough reality in 2009: they’d be far better off replacing their traditionally adversarial relationship with a partnership to assure their mutual health, if not their survival. The name of the game now is filling space. Rather than sacrifice more of their valued tenants, landlords are realizing they have to get creative and offer various incentives, enticements and rent concessions that they wouldn’t have considered at the height of the market just a few years ago.

The deal-making options remain on the table in 2010. Here’s an overview of some of those strategies:

Because shopping center landlords typically have mortgages to pay based on a tenant rent flow, they’re not always in a position to grant steep rent reductions or out-and-out free rent. But what they can offer is free rent, in effect, that’s prorated over several years. This is a win-win for both parties because the retailer is getting the rent adjustment it needs and the landlord isn’t getting beat up from a financing or valuation standpoint.

We also see deals where gradual step-up in rent occurs. For example, if a landlord wants a long-term “market” rent of $20,000 per month, but the tenant can’t reconcile those numbers under present conditions, the landlord might agree to accept something like $12,000 the first year, $14,000 the next and so on until the tenant is paying the full amount, with standard increases set to kick in during ensuing years. This helps the landlords recoup the shortfall and gives tenants more leeway to build their businesses in tough times and eventually gives landlords the market rent they need.

Every deal is critical these days, particularly as shrinking retail occupancies cause “co-tenancy clauses” to kick in for some retailers. This can start a devastating domino effect where one vacancy leads to another. Once a center gets the reputation of being half-empty, it is a disappointment for the landlord, for the tenant and for the consumer.

It is much better to nip the problem in the bud by offering the would-be departing tenant an alternative of half their average rent for six months to a year, which allows them more latitude to re-evaluate their situation. Similarly, many tenants have a “go-dark clause” that allows them to close without reason before the end of their term, even though they’re still obligated to pay rent. In many of these cases, the tenant will agree to keep operating if their rent is reduced. But as with all partnerships, trust is earned—if tenants are seeking rent breaks, they should expect to open their books to show their pain to the landlord.

Landlords can also offer performance-based deals with tenants. For example, a tenant might agree to pay $22 per-square-foot over the first 5 years of a lease if they can generate $300 of sales per square foot, then pay $25 per square foot if they hit $400 per square foot in sales, and so on. Other deals can be structured so retailers pay a percentage-of-sales rent for three years, then permanently lock into the three-year average when they enter the fourth year of their lease.

We’ve seen some tenants agree to pre-pay their rent at a discount, which is a good solution if the landlord is hurting for cash flow. It also assures that the landlord won’t have to chase the tenant for rent at any point – another win-win.

As for aggressive tenant recruitment tactics, landlords can offer tenants the flexibility to cancel their leases during their term with minor termination penalties. Temporary pop-up stores are another good way for landlords to fill spaces and derive immediate income – and for tenants to test-market their products with minimal risks. Such leases can be structured for longer term options.

Robin Abrams is an X Team International partner and executive vice president of New York-based The Lansco Corporation.

Jerry Welkis is an X Team International partner and president of New York-based Welco Realty, Inc.

The Meadtown Shopping Center in Kinnelon has seen enough turnover to reflect the recession's impact on the retail industry.

STAFF PHOTOS BY AMY NEWMAN
At the Meadtown Shopping Center in Kinnelon, Petco replaced the Rag Shop. Sylvia Mastropole and her husband, Sal, are opening a hair salon, and John Park is guiding his bagel shop through the downturn. Marty's Shoes is vacant.

The departure of the Rag Shop in 2007 left a 16,100-square-foot vacancy that was followed by the loss of stores from other chains — Marty's Shoes, ice cream vendor Cold Stone Creamery, Ritz Camera's Shop Inc. and the local chain Falls View Grill. A Blimpie's sandwich store also vacated its space adjacent to the mall.

stripmall_photo Such vacancies by national and local chains at Meadtown and other strip malls in northern New Jersey are leading to concessions by landlords and opportunities for small businesses to occupy space that has been out of their reach.

Retail vacancy rates for North and Central Jersey were 8.2 percent in August, about three percentage points higher than a year ago, though still below a national average that has been as high as 15 percent, said Chuck Lanyard, president of New Jersey's largest retail brokerage firm The Goldstein Group, quoting from his agency's most recent report.

"With that percent, landlords are taking non-traditional tenants that they normally wouldn't," said Lanyard.

Meadtown's small businesses such as Kinnelon Bagel and Kataw Jewelers, a Hallmark cards and gifts independent franchise, and other chains have survived. With new neighbors moving in, the remaining businesses are cautiously optimistic a turnaround is on the horizon.

"Business is starting to show signs of improvement," said Bob Sterenson, who owns Lynne's Hallmark Shop with his wife, Lynne. "But I don't know if things have improved or just stopped getting worse."

Things took an optimistic turn recently when pet-store chain Petco took over The Rag Shop space and the South Beach Tanning Spa LLC took the Cold Stone Creamery site in late November. Earlier this year, Meadtown got additional traffic from new tenants in the adjoining strip mall that shares the parking lot — the Butler Bowl Plaza. The New York Sports Club and the Wayne Pharmacy and Surgical Supply moved in and a new hair salon/day spa is expected to open in February.

Negotiations are under way to fill most of the 15,000-plus square feet still vacant in Meadtown, said Jerry Welkis, president of Welco Realty Inc. in New Rochelle, N.Y., the mall's broker. "We're finalizing a deal right now for a shoe chain to take over the Marty's Shoes space," he said. "The idea is for them to open for spring of 2010."

A deal is also in the works with a restaurant to take the place of the Falls View Grill, he said, and Welkis hopes to lease all but 5,000 square feet by the late spring in the 77,000-square-foot mall. The shopping center has good visibility, customer traffic and easy access to Route 23, he said.

"This center is like a lot of other centers in New York and New Jersey," said Welkis. "It really got hit with an onslaught of major companies going into bankruptcy. It has nothing to do with the center itself."

New interest in Meadtown and Butler Bowl Plaza came recently after the owners of the 47-year-old bowling alley in the Butler shopping center gutted it in 2007 and replaced it with four storefronts and the sports club.

Sal Mastropole and his wife, Sylvia, a hairstylist, plan to open "b euphoria" a hair salon and day spa, in a 1,900-square-foot space in February as her first salon business. "There's traffic — lots of people walking — it's accessible and off of a major highway," said Sal Mastropole. "It's a no-brainer."

That leaves 2,500 square feet still left to rent for the Butler plaza's owners. "We're optimistic," said Jim Rohrer, president of Butler Bowl Inc., a consortium of 15 stakeholders. "We're getting a lot of phone calls for the space we have. They're looking, but they're also shopping."

The storefronts are small, said Rohrer, so the callers are doctors and physical therapists and convenience and nutrition stores attracted by the sports club.

Goldstein Group's Lanyard said dental practices, day-care businesses, hamburger franchises such as Smashburger and the health club LA Boxing are also opening in strip centers because it's more affordable now.

"There's a real entrepreneurial spirit out there,'' said Lanyard, "a window of opportunity [about 18 months] to get into great locations with landlords who will now entertain talking to [these] tenants."

In the case of Petco, Welkis said the property owner had to pay for and do the renovations — for an amount he wouldn't disclose. Pet stores are one of the few sectors that have prospered in the recession.

"We kept rent where we needed it to be and where we wanted it to be, but it cost the landlord some money to do that," Welkis said. "In other times, we wouldn't have had to." Welkis said in general, rents are as much as 30 percent lower than they were 1 1/2 to two years ago.

The lower lease rates prompted Rich Mayer and his family, who were looking to expand their two South Beach Tanning Spa salons, to choose Meadtown. They also wanted the parking and visibility, and they believed New York Sports Club members would be into tanning.

The landlord put in a drop ceiling, removed partitions, leveled the floor and installed lights in the 1,650-square-foot space.

"It's definitely a tenants' market," said Mayer, "because price per square foot is much cheaper now than when the economy was better," about 30 percent to 50 percent less, he said. Kinnelon Bagel owner John Park said he has yet to see business pick up from the new tenants in Meadtown, although the business has survived the vacancies and the recession. Sales dropped as much as 40 percent from January to early April but picked up over the summer, only to fall after September. October sales were down as much as 15 percent compared with a year ago, said Park.

"It's going to take some time" to recuperate, he said.

Other businesses have seen more evidence of a turnaround. The sports club's entrance in the back of Meadtown by the movie theater has given new attention to the otherwise out-of-the-way Meadtown Barber Shop.

"That has helped," said owner Ray Mininni. "You have to have stores that bring people. We're hoping they do good."

New Rochelle, NY – October 12, 2009 — Welco Realty, Inc., an X Team partner, announced today that it has leased three former Linens & Things locations. 1) A former 60,000 s.f. Linens & Things store was leased to Dick’s Sporting Goods in Paramus Towne Square, Paramus, New Jersey due to open Spring 2010. 2) A portion of the former Linens & Things in New Rochelle, New York (14,000 s.f.) was leased to Party City. 3) A division of T.J.X Companies, Home Goods, leased approximately 25,000 s.f. of the former Linens & Things space in the Nassau Park Pavilion in Princeton, New Jersey. Nassau Park Pavilion is owned and managed by Developers Diversified Realty.

About Welco Realty – Welco Realty, Inc. was formed more than 25 years ago to specialize in retail site selection for retail chains and to represent shopping center developers and landlords as their retail leasing specialists. Welco Realty’s objective is simply to provide high quality professional Real Estate Consulting / Brokerage services catered to our clients’ needs. Welco Realty works closely with its retail clients to help develop their store expansion strategy to include market analysis, site selection, demographics, competition evaluation and lease negotiations to successfully conclude all transactions. Welco works with their developer clients from ground up construction to leasing vacancies in existing centers. Welco has an aggressive marketing approach to finding the right tenant for the right property.

For more information, contact Mr. Jerry Welkis at jwelkis@welcorealty.com.

About X Team – X Team International is a leading retail real estate brokerage alliance serving the world’s premier tenants, landlords, developers, owners and third party service providers. Comprised of industry professionals from small and mid-sized boutique firms who average more than 20 years of experience, X Team International has proven expertise in more than 45 major markets, and partners located in some of the largest cities throughout the U.S., Canada and Europe.

Leveraging the extensive knowledge and years of industry experience shared by X Team International partners, the alliance specializes in tenant representation, developer/landlord representation, distressed property consulting, retailer property dispositions/workouts and retail investments. From in-depth analyses to site selection, leasing and transaction negotiations, no one is more qualified to handle your retail real estate needs and help you achieve your goals than X Team International.

Mission – By combining passion and market-specific insight gained from years of successfully representing all facets of the retail real estate industry, X Team International partners are committed to providing superior, client-focused service and achieving the strategic goals necessary for the success of every client. Visit XTeam.net

Houston, TX – X Team, an international alliance of retail real estate advisors, said Tuesday that several of its partners have received the 2008 Power Broker Award from CoStar Group.

Each year, CoStar Group acknowledges the top firms and individual dealmakers by market based on their overall transaction volume for the entire year in a variety of categories.

Two X Team partner firms were recognized as Top Leasing Firms/Lease Transactions: Jacksonville, Fla.-based Strategic Sites Clifford Commercial and New York City -based Welco Realty.

In addition, seven individuals were recognized as Top Retail Leasing Brokers/Individual Leasing Transactions: John Cumbelich and Ben Lazzareschi of San Francisco-based John Cumbelich & Associates; Raymond Kenney of Boston-based Strategic Retail Advisors; Jerry Welkis of New York City-based Welco Realty; Steve Miller of Miami-based The Rotella Group; and Charlotte Walley and John Zikos of Dallas-based Venture Commercial Real Estate.

Elaine Misonzhnik – At a time when retail landlords are struggling with record vacancies, a novel sales strategy employed by some tenants is helping them fill the gaps and earn some additional rental income. Pop-up stores, which allow a retailer to sign a temporary lease lasting anywhere from two months to six months, have traditionally been scoffed at by mall and shopping center owners who could take their pick of permanent tenants. But in today’s environment, with retailers wary of new store openings, pop-ups are becoming a hot new trend and landlords are finding it suits them just fine.

“I am seeing more and more retailers testing out a temporary location, rather than locking into a long-term [lease],” says Jerry Welkis, partner with Welco Realty, Inc., a New Rochelle, N.Y.-based brokerage firm and member of the national X Team retail services network. “It’s a win/win kind of thing, because if a landlord has vacant space, he can get good tenants in and then get them out when he needs them out, and get some income as well.”

Earlier this year, casual apparel seller Gap Inc. secured temporary locations in Los Angeles and New York City to market its new product line, 1969 Premium Jeans. The stores will remain open through September. Luxury seller Gucci is planning to launch a traveling sneaker store in October, which will debut in New York City, move on to Miami and eventually appear in London, Berlin, Paris, Hong Kong and Tokyo, among other cities.

Meanwhile, this holiday shopping season, toy seller Toys “R” Us might open up to 70 pop-up stores on a national basis in markets previously occupied by defunct rival KB Toys, according to Welkis, whose firm worked with Toys “R” Us on two such locations in New Jersey. Footwear retailer Nine West has also been looking to do more pop-ups under its Bannister Shoes name. The chain uses the temporary locations to sell leftover merchandise. Target has used the strategy as well. For example, it opened up several temporary bodegas in New York City last year as a way of establishing a presence in Manhattan—where it currently operates stores.

Pop-up stores allow retailers to increase revenue during critical sales periods, including the back-to-school, Halloween and holiday shopping seasons, without taking on the risk of a permanent location, says Matthew Bordwin, managing director and national co-head of the real estate services team in the Melville, N.Y. office of KPMG Corporate Finance LLC, a middle-market investment bank. Down the line, if the temporary stores prove successful, they might lay the groundwork for permanent stores. Meanwhile, smaller, regional retailers might see temporary stores as a way to gain access to high-profile retail centers whose landlords would not otherwise view them as viable tenants.

There is a certain level of convenience as well, as most temporary locations don’t require any build-out work, and rental rates tend to be relatively affordable. There’s usually a fixed rental rate that encompasses common area charges and taxes and tends to be about half of what is paid by permanent tenants at the same center, plus anywhere from 4 percent to 7 percent in a percentage of sales rental fee, according to Welkis. But landlords, fearful about how an empty space in the middle of their property is going to affect shopper traffic, are more than happy with the arrangement right now.

“The landlords are open to anything, they are open to any retailer that has a concept and some money because they have empty space and empty space doesn’t pay the rent,” notes Bordwin.

In fact, as some national retailers have begun to take larger chunks of space for their temporary quarters—sneaker seller Reebok, for example, is looking for locations totaling at least 20,000 square feet—pop-ups are even helping fill up some vacancies in big boxes, says Welkis. The big-box category has been the most heavily hit by bankruptcies and liquidations this year, with the national vacancy rate hitting 7.3 percent in the first quarter, according to research from Marcus & Millichap Real Estate Services and the CoStar Group. That’s an increase of 280 basis points from 4.5 percent in the first quarter of 2008. But while pop-up shops will likely become a common sight as the retail industry heads into the holiday shopping season this fall, don’t look for the trend to hold up once real estate fundamentals return to more normal levels, says Jeff Green, president of Jeff Green Partners, a Mill Valley, Calif.-based consulting firm. For landlords, pop-ups represent a desperate measure and they will start saying no to them as soon as some permanent tenants appear on the horizon.

“This is a really unique time,” Green says. “I am not sure we’ve had such a long, deep recession [before] and one in which the consumer really put on the brakes in terms of shopping. The developers are not totally thrilled with this idea, but they realize they have to do something to increase their income. It’s not something they will want to do long-term.”

New Rochelle, NY – Welco Realty, Inc., was pleased to represent Hartz Mountain Industries on the opening of the T.J.Maxx store in Secaucus, New Jersey, which was part of the redevelopment of the Mill Creek Mall. The store is 28,414 s.f. T.J.Maxx had a tremendous opening. Babies R Us superstore and Sports Authority will be following with their respective opening shortly.

Welco Realty, Inc., also has represented Hartz Mountain Industries on the leasing of the present Loew’s Theaters in Secaucus, New Jersey (43,000 sf) to LA Fitness Center. LA Fitness Center will now join other major retailers in the Harmon Meadow retail and office complex, such as Walmart, Sams, Marshall’s, Home Goods, Sports Authority, Babies R Us, Toys R Us, T.J.Maxx, A.C.Moore, PetsMart and a new 14 plex stadium seating theater will be opening in late 2009 early 2010.

For more information, contact Mr. Jerry Welkis at jwelkis@welcorealty.com.

New York, NY – Welco Realty, Inc. has been retained to exclusively represent Strike Holdings in Westchester, Long Island, the Boroughs excluding Manhattan . Their stores are typically 32,000 sf. Welco Realty, Inc. has just signed a lease with TJ Maxx for a 28,000 sf store in Mill Creek Mall, Secaucus , New Jersey. Welco Realty Inc. represented the Landlord, Hartz Mountain Industries, on the Sports Authority lease for a store of 50,000 sf in Mill Creek Mall, Secaucus , New Jersey. Welco Realty, Inc. has been retained to exclusively represent Babies / Toys R Us in Southern Connecticut and portions of Westchester . Their stores are typically 65,000 – 70,000 sf.

New York, NY – Welco Realty has just signed two leases with P.C. Richard & Son for a 30,000 sf store in Nanuet , New York and a 35,000 sf store in Kearny , New Jersey. X Team partner Welco Realty, Inc., based in New Rochelle , New York represented P.C.Richard & Son in both of these transactions. P.C. Richard & Son is a regional Home Entertainment, Electronics and Appliance store with 49 Superstores serving the NY, NJ and metro area. P.C.Richard & Son was founded in 1909 and is recognized as the “#1 Family owned and operated Appliance / Electronics / Computer Retail in America ” with 4 generations of Richard Family ownership (www.pcrichard.com). For more information about P.C.Richard & Son, contact Mr. Jerry Welkis at jwelkis@welcorealty.com.

New York, NY – Welco Realty has just signed two leases with Babies / Toys R Us for a 69,000 sf store on Route 18, Summerhill Square, East Brunswick, New Jersey and 64,000 sf in Harmon Meadow in Secaucus, New Jersey. X Team partner Welco Realty, Inc., based in New Rochelle, New York represented the Landlord in both of these transactions. Toys “R” Us, Inc. is one of the leading retailers of toys and baby products with more than 1,500 freestanding destination toy and baby specialty stores worldwide. The company sells merchandise through 586 toy stores in the U.S. and more than 670 international toy stores, including licensed and franchise stores, as well as through its Internet site at www.toysrus.com. Babies "R" Us is the largest baby product specialty store chain in the world and a leader in the juvenile industry, and sells merchandise in more than 250 stores in the U.S. as well as on the Internet at www.babiesrus.com. For more information about Babies / Toys R Us combination stores, contact Mr. Jerry Welkis at jwelkis@welcorealty.com.