Clothing:
!! Walmart EVP of corporate affairs Dan Bartlett tells @YahooFinance that amid #coronavirus: “We are seeing increased sales in tops, but not bottoms” because so many people are doing video conferences from home. and all that matters is the above the waist shot. $WMT
— Daniel Roberts (@readDanwrite) March 26, 2020
Food:
The Cheesecake Factory tells landlords it will not be paying rents on April 1 https://t.co/AHjWusegPa pic.twitter.com/XlAevQxwWm
— Eater (@Eater) March 25, 2020
It begins. Seems to me like CF has the leverage right now; they can demand mitigation because their landlords don’t have much of an option. From what I’ve seen of them, repurposing those joints would be a massive undertaking. And there’s not gonna be a shortage of empty restaurant spaces, once this is over (or at least settling down to a dull background roar)…
… The Calabasas Hills-based company informed all of its landlords in a letter dated March 18 (reproduced [at the link]) that a severe decline in restaurant traffic has decreased its cash flow and “inflicted a tremendous financial blow” to business. Cheesecake Factory’s affiliated restaurants, such as Rock Sugar and North Italia, will also not make April 1 rent payments.
Company chairman and CEO David Overton writes, “Due to these extraordinary events, I am asking for your patience, and frankly, your help.” He continues, “we appreciate our landlords’ understanding given the exigency of the current situation.” The letter says that the company hopes to resume paying rent as soon as possible…
… In total, it operates 294 restaurants in 39 states, plus the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and Toronto, Canada. In 2019, the company also acquired Phoenix-based Fox Restaurants, including North Italia, Flower Child, and The Henry. Most of the company’s landlords are malls, including Simon and Westfield…
Since the outbreak of the coronavirus, the Cheesecake Factory has closed 27 locations across the country, and pivoted other locations to a takeout and delivery-only model — which it said just days ago was enabling the company to “operate sustainably at present” — and its stock price has fallen by more than 50 percent in the past month.
With 38,000 employees, the Cheesecake Factory is one of the largest restaurant employers in the country. Given its recent stock woes and the ongoing reduction in business due to the coronavirus pandemic, it seems possible that it, like many restaurants, could end up needing a bailout to survive…
And to complete the economists’ clothing, food, shelter trilogy of basics — AirBnB has pretty much lost its regulatory argument with big-city governments; it’s not just a handful of nice amateurs renting out their spare rooms on an occasional weekend…
700 new Craigslist ads for furnished rentals in SF, posted this weekend. All in houses/apts, not in short term rentals. Are we seeing the implosion of AirBnB in real-time?
— ?? (@becauseberkeley) March 23, 2020
Business Under Lockdown Edition: Street Level RetailPost + Comments (148)