WESTBURY, NY-The Fortunoff family, which last July bought back the intellectual property of the department store chain bearing its name, has also made a move with real property. It has hired CB Richard Ellis to spearhead an office leasing campaign for approximately 114,000 square feet of space at the former Fortunoff flagship store at 1300 Old Country Rd. here. A CBRE spokesman tells GlobeSt.com the remainder of the 220,000-square-foot property is currently planned to be set aside for retail.
CBRE’s Vincent LaManna and Richard Freel will spearhead the leasing campaign on behalf of the property’s ownership, the Fortunoff family. The property is adjacent to the Source Mall, and the access to shopping and restaurants is one of the locational aspects the CBRE team will be highlighting. They’ll also focus on its convenience to both highways and mass transit as well as the signage and branding opportunities that 1300 Old Country offers, according to a release.
The conversion to office space is intended to accommodate a variety of large block users including educational, corporate back office, medical and government agency tenants. It offers ceiling heights of up to 18 feet, and the CBRE spokesman says the ownership is offering a work allowance for tenant improvements.
Marketing the Old Country Road space for mixed use comes about a year after the Fortunoff and Mayrock families bought back the Fortunoff brand name and related intellectual property, including web domain names, for a reported $1.8 million at an auction held at the Manhattan offices of law firm Sidley Austin. It’s another step back along a road that seemingly had ended when the chain liquidated all 20 of its retail stores throughout the tristate region and Pennsylvania.
Those 2009 liquidation sales followed the February ’09 Chapter 11 filing that occurred a year after Fortunoff was bought out of a previous bankruptcy filing by NRDC Equity Partners, which owns Lord & Taylor department stores. Earlier in the decade, the Fortunoff family had sold a 75% interest in the company, founded in 1922 by Max and Clara Fortunoff, to private equity firms Trimaran Capital Partners and the Kier Group.
At the time, the Fortunoffs assumed that the sale would be a catalyst for long-term growth for the chain. “We could never imagine the Fortunoff brand name going into free fall when it has served as a retail icon for as long as anyone can remember,” David Fortunoff said in a release announcing the buyback of the brand name last July. “It has been a stunning series of events and we decided to redeem the Fortunoff brand.”
This past September, Fortunoff Brands, the holding company that now controls the intellectual property, announced a licensing agreement with Furniture Concepts, a newly formed entity under the control of two former Fortunoff executives. Separately, Texas-based retailer Chair King bought a controlling interest in Furniture Concepts, with Chair King president David Barish assuming a similar role at Furniture Concepts. Seven Fortunoff Backyard Stores operated by Furniture Concepts were opened on Long Island and in New Jersey this past February.
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Paul Bubny
Paul Bubny is managing editor of Real Estate Forum and GlobeSt.com. He has been reporting on business since 1988 and on commercial real estate since 2007. He is based at ALM Real Estate Media Group's offices in New York City.
