Gialanella, who has close ties to Cushman's London-based European operation Healy & Baker--the two firms merged in 1998--tells GlobeSt.com he is planning to aggressively pursue the US retail market, which, he says, is poised to become one of the "top three or four businesses" on Cushman's domestic priority list. "We're already in it," he says. "Now we want to grow it."

To that end, Gialanella has spent the last three weeks assembling an in-house team to head up the retail group. "I basically have got our retail strategy moving in three or four directions. I've built a core staff of people. I brought a Healy & Baker person in to focus on cross-border business development and client servicing. Another individual, based in Chicago, is coordinating the focus on domestic research in retail areas." Technology and sales and marketing professionals have also been brought onboard to round out the group, Gialanella says.

The appointment is a promise fulfilled for Bruce Mosler, president of US operations at the firm. In an interview with GlobeSt.com held two weeks after he was appointed to the newly created position in August 2000, Mosler outlined his plan to beef up C&W's domestic retail business. "Retail will be a significant part of the mix by 2002," Mosler said. While the Healy & Baker merger solidified C&W's European retail business, on this side of the pond, "we're not a national player yet; we're in a few pockets," he added.