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Citadel Partners’ Fort Worth team, from left: Cullen Donohue, Gisselle Galvan, Anna Lee Moore, Andy Goldston and Wiley Green. (Courtesy photo | Citadel Partners)
” data-medium-file=”https://fortworthreport.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/CP-Fort-Worth-team-8.12.24-scaled.jpg?fit=300%2C252&ssl=1″ data-large-file=”https://fortworthreport.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/CP-Fort-Worth-team-8.12.24-scaled.jpg?fit=780%2C654&ssl=1″ tabindex=”0″ role=”button”>How strong is the Fort Worth commercial real estate market? Fort Worth came out of COVID-19 stronger than any other place in the country did, said Citadel Partners’ Andy Goldston, a market principal who opened the commercial real estate firm’s first office in Fort Worth in 2019. “I think a lot of companies really changed their tune as far as what they look for in office space after COVID,” said Goldston. “There was a need for Class A office space to bring back employees and also to recruit and retain the talent companies have. It was very important.” Since opening in Fort Worth, Citadel Partners has expanded its presence in the city, recently relocating its inaugural office to one of their showpiece properties, One City Place and Two City Place owned by Spire Realty Group, and growing its Tarrant County team. This all comes on the heels of adding a project leasing service line and hiring real estate veteran Cullen Donohue to grow the landlord side of the business. “Downtown Fort Worth remains the central business hub in Fort Worth,” Goldston said. “We’re happy to be here.” The City Place towers are great symbols of downtown’s strength, Goldston said. The Class A 19-story twin towers at 300 Throckmorton and 100 Throckmorton total 531,468 square feet. The buildings were formerly known as Tandy Center, the headquarters of RadioShack, and were built in the mid-1970s. City Place is over 90% leased with lead tenants being Range Resources, Texas Capital Bank and ____. Companies want to be in Fort Worth, Goldston said. “This building offers best-in-class amenities and is in the heart of downtown, providing walkability to some of the city’s best retail and restaurants,” he said. “People coming from outside the area in particular, they’re blown away. Fort Worth has a lot to offer.” Restaurants on the bottom floor of the building, as well as those in the downtown area, are key amenities for the downtown office market, Goldston said. The recently reopened Wild Salsa, a Mexico City-style restaurant and tequila bar at 300 Throckmorton St., has been a favorite place for lunch and after work, Donohue said. “It’s a great spot, but one of many in downtown,” he said. “There’s so much variety.” Goldston joined Citadel Partners in 2013, working on the Dallas side of the market. But with the birth of twins in 2019 and a wife who went to TCU, the couple looked west to Horned Frog land to raise their family. He approached Citadel management and they were all for opening a Fort Worth outpost. “We were working with a lot of tenants over here already and doing a lot of transactions, but we didn’t have an office, so it made sense,” he said. There are more on the way, Donohue said. “We’ve been able to compile a portfolio of about a million square feet of office space in Fort Worth and have a couple other big projects that I hope we can announce soon,” he said. There are other factors that are working in the city’s favor, Goldston said. Fort Worth ranks No. 7 on WalletHub’s 2024 Best Large Cities to Start a Business in the United States and the best in Texas based on office space affordability, labor costs and five-year business survival rates, according to Citadel Partners. Those are all big positives for Fort Worth, Goldston said. Along with the City Place leases, Citadel Partners also represents The Tower, which recently saw iconic Fort Worth brand Dickies relocate headquarters there. They also represent Proof, the historic renovation project completed by M2G Ventures several years ago in the Near Southside.  Melt unplugging freezer in Sundance On Sept. 8, Melt Ice Creams is closing up shop at its Sundance Square location at 308 Houston St. after five years. Like former neighbors Reata Restaurant and Four Day Weekend, they are leaving the area. “We invite everyone to visit our Sundance Square scoop shop one last time to celebrate the end of this chapter with us and say goodbye to our incredible staff at this shop,” Melt said on its Facebook page. Melt Ice Creams made its debut in 2014 in the Near Southside and recently opened a location in Willow Park. Those locations remain open. .Leases and things In a record turnaround, Bradford Commercial Real Estate Services has fully leased an 18,000-square-foot industrial project in the Great Southwest Industrial District and sold it to a first-time investor in Texas in an all-cash trade that closed in less than 30 days.Panamint Holdings LLC scooped up the deed to 800-810 N. Great Southwest Parkway in Arlington. Michael W. Spain, executive vice president and managing partner of Bradford Commercial Real Estate Services; Jason Finch, senior vice president; and Chris Wong, managing partner, represented the seller, CanTex800 LLC, in the direct deal.The new owner, with assets in Oregon and Florida, made one of four offers on the table for the industrial project. Panamint’s all-cash, quick-close offer was the deciding factor in the sale of a five-tenant building with lease rollovers in the coming months.Samidon Holdings LLC has sold Colleyville Professional Park, totaling 4,327 square feet of office space, on 0.71 acres at 6407 Colleyville Blvd., Colleyville, to SR Americas Holdings LLC. Bradford’s Finch and Justin Greenwood, market director, represented the seller in the direct deal.Higginbotham grows in southeast Higginbotham has joined forces with Cassidy & Company of Tampa to strengthen its specialty life insurance planning expertise and provide additional support to partner offices in Florida, Tennessee and Mississippi.With the addition of specialty firm Cassidy & Company, Higginbotham has moved to add sophisticated financial services support to the regional mix.Wage dispute in Southlake Federal officials have recovered $103,665 in back wages for 38 workers at a Southlake-based landscaping company, according to an announcement by the U.S. Department of Labor on Sept. 3. The landscaping company, Above & Beyond Landscaping, misclassified 38 workers as independent contractors and denied them overtime pay from January 2022 to January 2024, according to an investigation by the department’s Wage and Hour Division. The division determined Above & Beyond Landscaping’s violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act included not keeping accurate records and failing to pay overtime at time and one-half of an employee’s rate of pay for hours over 40 worked in a workweek.ShipBob consolidates local operationsE-commerce fulfillment platform ShipBob has consolidated two operations in Dallas and Grapevine at a new facility in Fort Worth. This site, as well as a similar site in North Aurora, Illinois, are referred to as ShipBob Innovation Centers. Both are larger than 250,000 square feet in size and serve as the inventory receiving hubs within their respective regions. Those hubs feed into ShipBob’s nearby spoke sites, which primarily focus on fulfilling direct-to-consumer and retail orders quickly.The relocations will result in 51 job cuts, but employees will be offered the opportunity to transfer to the new facility, according to ShipBob. ShipBob is a global supply chain and fulfillment technology platform designed for small and medium businesses and mid-market e-commerce merchants. Continental Tire plans industrial building in south Fort Worth South Carolina tire manufacturer Continental Tire is building a $69 million industrial building in south Fort Worth. The project will include a 752,000-square-foot build-to-suit building with 7,500 square feet of support offices at 10101 Burleson Road, according to a filing with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation. The building will be in the 85.9 acre Risinger/35 Logistics Park, which was developed by Hillwood. In August, Dick’s Sporting Goods announced it was constructing an 800,000-square-foot regional distribution center in the same industrial park that is expected to bring 300 new full-time jobs to the region over the next decade. Dallas-based GSR Andrade Architects is listed as the designer of the Continental Tire project. Completion is estimated at the end of January 2026. Continental Tire has made no official statement on the project. Sliders in cans coming to Fort Worth Smalls Sliders, a cheeseburger slider brand with over 300 locations open or under development, has signed its latest multiunit agreement with St. Louis-based entrepreneur Brett Stewart to bring six of its restaurants to the Fort Worth area. Stewart looks to drop the first of his six “Cans” in 2025. Smalls Sliders restaurants are called “Cans” because they resemble railroad boxcars painted a distinctive orange. Among the investors in the brand is retired NFL quarterback Drew Brees. The brand is planning to drop Cans in Fort Worth, White Settlement, Weatherford, Granbury, Cleburne and Stephenville, according to a news release. Do you have something for the Bob on Business column? Email Bob Francis at bob.francis@fortworthreport.org.Bob Francis is business editor for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at bob.francis@fortworthreport.org. At the Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.