On our 10th episode, we connected with James Rodriguez, Colliers’ Senior Vice President of Retail in Los Angeles, who focuses on the Hispanic grocery market. Take a listen and learn about the top performing Hispanic grocers serving the Southwest region and what they all have in common. Without giving too much away, James shares with us that one of the key factors to their success is their ability to customize their merchandise mix in specific trade areas. Keep in mind, there are different culinary recipes and traditions depending on the region in Latin America or Mexico, therefore it’s critical these stores recognize their unique consumer.

We are seeing new trends evolve in the Hispanic sector, which includes the changing demographic of their consumer, store format (size and layout) and the big news now is private equity entering the space. Want to learn more – take a listen to the podcast.

For our ninth episode, we connected with Peter DeBiase, President of Restaurant Trends, whose family has dedicated much of their careers to examining every dimension of the business of restaurants — specifically chain restaurants or those in the QSR space — and sharing the data and insights collected throughout the process. 

We spent the bulk of our conversation peeling away the layers of the different trends that have affected the restaurant industry over the past year — identifying which were truly “trends” and which could better be described as permanent changes to the landscape of the restaurant industry. Further, we analyzed the nuances that have inspired these shifts and the byproducts (good, bad or otherwise) that have followed.

Listen to the full episode to learn Peter’s take on the influence of delivery and drive-thrus, the impact of the “entertainment” (form over function) of the art of dining over the past few decades, and much (much) more.

As the temperatures and vaccination rates both creep up, visions of buzzing restaurants and chilled drinks are starting to approach the sphere of "normalcy" once again. With an appetite to learn more about "a day in the life of a retail broker" during this almost-post-COVID era, we connected with one of our top restaurant brokers, David Gabbai, Executive Managing Director out of our Orlando, FL office, to get a flavor for how the market is performing in the Central Florida region (and beyond).

With more than $1B in closed transaction value and more than 30 years of experience under his belt, he was perfectly positioned to explain how he's seeing his clients react, pivot and triumph in the current retail climate and what key ingredients come together to form the secret sauce that garnishes his team's success.

It was fitting that we capped off Women’s History Month by interviewing a woman who has made a dazzling career for herself out of championing other women in CRE: Allison Weiss of CRE Recruiting. Let the record show, though, that her recruiting talents — currently utilized as Founder of CRE Recruiting & CRE at Work — are entirely unbounded by gender. 

Backed by 10+ years of experience in full-cycle recruiting, business strategy, marketing, branding and leadership, Allison has recruited hundreds of CRE professionals nationally, across all facets of the industry. Her proven track record of success of “working backwards from her clients’ goals” to secure their next positions speaks for itself.  

During a relatively short conversation that could have easily evolved into an hours-long conversation, we touched on the introspection required within a successful recruiting transaction, Allison's mission of making CRE a great place for everyone and much more.

February was a short month with a long to-do list, but we're thrilled to bring to you this next episode to kick off the month of March.

For this month's episode, we stole some time on Jazmen Johnson's calendar to discuss diversity, equity and inclusion — specifically within the commercial real estate industry. As the Director of DE&I for ICSC, Jazmen is uniquely qualified to speak to the matter and, within this episode, we discuss the evolution of ICSC as an organization — pandemic-inspired and otherwise — as well as that of the DE&I program within ICSC. She also shares the backstory of ICSC’s Launch Academy: the ICSC Foundation’s newest talent initiative whose goal is to recruit and develop racially diverse college students to get into CRE.

Listen now to learn how a self-proclaimed introvert leveraged networking and other strategies to catapult her career in CRE to where it is today, as well as what is quickly becoming our podcast's favorite answer to the "if you could be any retail brand, what brand would you be?" question.

To kick the year off on an inspiring and refreshing note, Anjee connected with Shopify's Kristen LaFrance for an episode chock-full of insights, creativity and energy with the "official mayor of DTC Twitter." As the host of Shopify's Resilient Retail podcast series (and Playing for Keeps and eComm Noms before that), LaFrance was a no-brainer as a guest on our show. Her depth of experience crafting successful omnichannel customer retention strategies and helping online and offline brands connect with customers proved valuable throughout the 19-minute conversation.

In an interview tucked in between Black Friday and the Christmas holiday, Anjee Solanki, National Director of Retail Services in the U.S. for Colliers International, catches up with Director of Consumer and Retail Trends at Creditntell Seema Shah. Armed with more than 20 years of experience in consumer sector research and retail analysis, Seema was well suited to address the shift in retail growing from brick-and-mortar to online over the last year due to the pandemic.

Tune into December's episode, the fifth in our series, to learn which retail category has seen the highest online and offline retail growth, which category has seen more of a downward trend, what brand Seema would be if she could embody one company, and much more.

For our fourth episode, we were lucky enough to find time for a conversation with retail powerhouse, Carrie Bobb, founder and CEO of Carrie Bobb & Co. 

Over the course of this 12-minute episode, we learned how this industry veteran and retail "shero" earned her cape: completing more than $2 billion in transactions over the first 16 years of her career, landing a spot as one of the Power Women in Real Estate in San Diego in 2018 and tirelessly championing efforts to shatter the glass ceiling for female professionals in CRE. 

In our third episode, Anjee catches up with her counterparts representing the Industrial and Healthcare service lines. Pete Quinn, National Director for Industrial, and Shawn Janus, National Director for Healthcare, take turns weighing in with current market updates for their respective sectors.

In this episode, Anjee Solanki, National Director of Retail Services in the U.S. for Colliers International, catches up with Grant Guidinger, VP of Real Estate for WellBiz Brands, Inc., an umbrella company that encompasses Amazing Lash Studio, Elements Massage and Fitness Together.