Breaking News
Modell’s Will Go Forward

Some six weeks after hiring restructuring advisor Berkeley Research Group (BRG), Modell’s Sporting Goods, the New York retail institution, is in the midst of plotting its future without BRG and apparently without the need for a bankruptcy filing.

CEO Mitch Modell has broken the retailer’s silence on its financial plight and future to the Wall Street Journal, telling the Journal that the retailer has hired a new CFO, will inject $6.8 million in new capital into the business shortly, has scored rent concessions from some landlords and will close an unspecified number of its current 150 doors as it shifts to more pop-up stores and smaller formats. It’s not immediately clear if Modell’s go-forward strategy will focus exclusively on its home New York-New Jersey market or continue to include a presence in other Northeast corridor metro areas such as Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C.

With David Stern set to replace BRG’s Mark Renzi as Modell’s CFO today, Mitch Modell, the chain’s senior executive and fourth-generation Modell to lead the family business, told the WSJ that he and his chief merchant, Charles Castaneda, have personally reached out to all of the chain’s 300 vendor partners in recent weeks to regain their confidence and financial backing while also assuring a steady flow of deliveries to the retailer.