When Claire’s Holdings LLC (“Claires”), the iconic global tween and teen fashion accessories brand, entered bankruptcy proceedings in 2025, the future of over a thousand stores, tens of thousands of employees and a beloved consumer brand hung in the balance.
For Ames Watson, the opportunity to rescue and turnaround the famous brand was significant, but hinged on whether the real estate portfolio could be stabilized quickly.
As a long-time strategic partner to Ames Watson and outsourced real estate advisor across multiple portfolio brands, RCS was tapped as the lead and quickly moved on the acquisition. Facing well over a thousand unresolved leases and a compressed timeline, RCS rapidly evaluated the portfolio, created a real estate action plan, negotiated with landlords across North America and helped preserve the store fleet necessary to make the transaction viable. Following the acquisition, RCS was entrusted with leading Claire’s real estate strategy across every dimension – retail, industrial and office – under new ownership while positioning the brand for long-term growth.
RCS’s engagement with Claire’s has spanned three interconnected workstreams:
On August 6th 2025, Claire’s filed for bankruptcy, placing its fleet of more than 1,000 stores at risk of mass closure. RCS was engaged by Ames Watson to assess the portfolio and support efforts to preserve the cherished brand. This was an extremely time-sensitive engagement, with closures imminent.
Working against multiple deadlines, RCS conducted lease-by-lease due diligence to identify which stores could be saved through lease restructurings and negotiated terms with landlords across the U.S. and Canada. These coordinated efforts culminated in securing lease agreements for approximately 950 stores, saving Claire’s core retail presence in major markets nationwide including California, New York, Florida and Illinois.
By stabilizing Claire’s portfolio ahead of the acquisition, RCS helped Ames Watson protect tens of thousands of jobs while preserving Claire’s core retail footprint, reinforcing how strategic real estate planning can transform a moment of distress into an opportunity for value creation.
With the retail footprint secured, RCS continued to guide Claire’s broader real estate strategy under Ames Watson’s ownership.
As part of the company’s supply chain modernization objectives, RCS worked alongside partners to source and negotiate a 284,000-square-foot long-term industrial lease in the Chicagoland area. The new logistics facility enhances Claire’s ability to execute omnichannel fulfillment by improving speed-to-store delivery and enabling greater inventory flexibility across channels, while strengthening the operational infrastructure critical to meeting today’s retail demands and supporting future expansion.
In parallel, RCS helped lead Claire’s suburban Chicago headquarters relocation. RCS and its local partners leveraged their deep understanding of the company’s needs to secure a new office location near Chicago’s Central Business District, guiding the site selection and lease negotiation process for the 43,200-square-foot office. The project aligned the company’s workplace footprint with its long-term business objectives, creating a modern office environment designed to support collaboration, attract talent, and enable continued growth, while reinforcing confidence in the brand’s trajectory.
This end-to-end engagement highlights RCS’s ability to support its private equity clients in managing complex real estate portfolios and transforming them into drivers of business recovery and growth. From stabilizing a portfolio of more than 900 stores at the time of acquisition to building the logistics and workplace infrastructure Claire’s needs to compete, RCS has been a constant through every phase of the brand’s comeback – and remains integral to its continued success.
The engagement underscores RCS’s ability to operate within the pace, complexity and pressure of private equity. With deep industry expertise and a results-driven approach, the firm consistently delivers immediate value creation, reinforcing its position as a leading real estate advisory partner to all entities shaping the future of the retail sector.
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