Chuck E. Cheese Problems Show Weakness with Experiential Retail

Chuck E. Cheese is trying to fend off bankruptcy.

The Wall Street Journal recently reported that the children’s restaurant and entertainment company was working with lenders to raise $200 million.

“I think they probably will have a challenge until they work out a new debt deal with their current lenders,” says Noah Shaffer, senior director of asset management for Confidant Asset Management.

But Shaffer does see a silver lining for Chuck E. Cheese. “The good thing for them is the world’s opening up again,” he says. “After people have been at home with their kids for four months, Chuck E. Cheese will get the opportunity to have revenue coming in.”

Still, Shaffer says the Chuck E. Cheese issues are a harbinger of what’s to come with experiential retailers. “I do think that a lot of the gyms are going to have a hard time getting back up to normal operations, to avoid filing bankruptcy,” Shaffer says.

But gyms aren’t the only businesses experiencing problems. Shaffer also sees mall retailers facing similar struggles. “All of these entertainment destination types of tenants could wind up like Chuck E Cheese,” Shaffer says. “There’s going to be a massive bloodbath in the mall space. Those entertainment tenants were the ones that were coming in to replace the department stores when they were going out of business.”

If the entertainment retailers have to go out of business, malls could find themselves in a difficult position. “It’s really hard to see what the heck is going to replace all of these retailers that are struggling right now,” Shaffer says. “Some of these malls are seeing four or five tenants leave. So there are going to be large-scale vacancies and mall closures across the country.”

Shaffer expects things to get worse in the next three months as more tenants face financial challenges. “The bigger problem is there are no new tenants who are moving to a space that Sam’s Club, Walmart and Home Depot are not in the mall space. It’s challenging to see who is going to fill those spaces.”

People have talked and written about converting malls into medical clinics or senior housing, but Shaffer doesn’t see that happening on a widespread basis.

“Both of those are very expensive and require a lot of capital,” Shaffer says. “It’s possible that you could retrofit a Sears to be a small-scale hospital or doctor’s offices or whatever, but that build-out is extremely high per square foot.” 

Housing prevents even more significant challenges. “With housing, you’ve got to build six-story apartments on your old adjacent J.C. Penney site. You’ve got to tear it down and then build it up. So it’s very capital intensive. It’s much more capital intensive than leasing it to another big box retail tenant, or splitting it up for ten retail tenants.” 

Shaffer estimates that splitting these spaces up for retail tenants would cost five to 10 percent of what it would take to redevelop them for medical or housing uses. Still those uses could make more sense long term.