When star retail broker Faith Hope Consolo made her very public and drawn out departure last year from long-time employer Garrick- Aug, market observers wondered how the retail brokerage would maintain its ascendant trajectory without its shooting star.
Though Garrick-Aug lost Consolo, the firm’s management has kept faith, expanding its overseas business and beginning a spate of hiring. By all observable measurements, Garrick-Aug appears to be not just surviving, but thriving.
“The loss of Faith would be a great loss to any company,” said Lawrence J. Selevan, chairman and chief executive officer of Garrick- Aug, founded in 1975 by Charles Aug. “However, her departure forced us to accelerate our new business plan.”
When Consolo left Garrick- Aug, which was the first New York brokerage to focus exclusively on retail leasing, she took her partner Joseph Aquino and a staff of 12 to more than double the size of the retail division at Prudential Douglas Elliman, which had merely dabbled in finding space for retail businesses in the past.
Since her departure, Garrick-Aug has signed on 18 new leasing agents and staff, Selevan said. ” We are now making proposals on major retail spaces throughout the city,” he said.
“We have increased our landlord agencies over 10-fold, and our tenant representations over 20-fold.”
In a new international initiative (Consolo founded the company’s international division in 1987), the company recently signed an agreement with KLM Properties, a retail-focused brokerage based in London. About two dozen brokers in the U.K. will tout Manhattan space to upscale retailers.
KLM will also assist Garrick- Aug by introducing European investors to equity investments in Manhattan retail opportunities.
Domestically, Garrick-Aug, which has leasing agents covering New York, Connecticut and New Jersey, recently signed an exclusive with the Hawaii-based company Cheeseburger in Paradise.
Georgia Malone joined Garrick- Aug’s advisory board and the firm appointed Leonard Rosenblatt as managing director of the tenant representation group.
Other new hires include David Chaiken, Amber Ortiz, Michael Kramer, Cynthia Chapin, Paulette Powell, Mark Klok, Agnes Banda, Monica Kass, George Carhart Jr., and Jordan Spiegel.
“Within a very brief period, we have hired some of the most talented people I have seen in any industry,” Selevan said.