- 5/5 Stars rating on Google
Negotiate lease
Retail
Premium NZ shopping centre
The result
Saved per year on the negotiated lease terms, every year of the lease.
Shopping centre negotiation at a premium NZ mall. Secured a fitout contribution, lower accommodation costs, a fixed-percentage rent review, a lower bank guarantee and waived personal guarantees.
Flo & Frankie — women's fashion & lifestyle retailer
Retail
Premium New Zealand shopping centre
Lease negotiation
Secure a shopping-centre lease at a premium mall, within a set cost benchmark.
The situation
Flo & Frankie built their name in a standalone store on Broadway — fashion, design and lifestyle goods under one roof, helping women feel confident at any age. The business was ready to grow into shopping centres, and the first site was a premium New Zealand mall.
A shopping-centre lease is a different animal to a high-street one. Percentage rent, strict fit-out rules, and a leasing executive who negotiates these deals every week. Flo & Frankie had an offer in hand — and their interior designer told them to get someone on their side before signing it.
What was at stake
The initial offer was the landlord's offer — built to suit the centre, not the tenant.
A shopping-centre lease locks in your cost base for years. Get the base rent, the percentage rent or the rent-review structure wrong, and you overpay every year of the term. Then again at each review — because increases compound off a number you set on day one.
There's also the fine print most tenants don't price. A personal guarantee that puts the founder's own assets on the line. A bank guarantee that ties up cash the business could use elsewhere. A fit-out bill the landlord could have helped carry.
For a retailer expanding store by store, a weak first centre lease isn't one bad deal. It's the benchmark every future deal gets measured against.
What we did
Flo & Frankie brought in Marcus from Proactive Property Group — a tenant-side adviser who has sat on both sides of the table, as landlord and tenant. The job: make the deal fit the business, not the centre.
Met the centre's leasing executive and worked through the initial offer line by line, separating what was negotiable from what wasn't.
Collected and analysed rental evidence from comparable women's fashion precincts within the centre — so the counter-offer was benchmarked against real data, not guessed.
Modelled contract rent, percentage rent, OPEX, rent-review structure and tenure across entry, occupation and exit — and tested every version against Flo & Frankie's cost threshold.
Four rounds with the leasing executive, holding to the numbers, until the commercial terms met the cost benchmark the business had set.
The result
The final lease landed inside Flo & Frankie's cost threshold, with six terms shifted in their favour:
Less of the fit-out paid from the tenant's own pocket on day one.
A smaller occupancy cost every year
of the term.
Slower cost growth across the life of the lease.
Less of the business's cash tied up as security.
The founder's personal assets kept out
of the lease.
A lower base rent that compounds into savings
every year, not just once.
That last point is where the real money sits. By locking in a competitive fixed rent review off a lower base, the saving doesn't happen once at signing. It compounds. For Flo & Frankie it came to $106,000 a year, every year of the term.
If you're facing the same thing
A shopping-centre lease is written to protect the centre. Every term in it was set by people who negotiate them for a living. The only way a tenant levels that up is to bring the same experience to their own side of the table — before the offer is signed, while there's still room to move.
About the adviser
Marcus has spent 20 years acting for tenants across New Zealand and the East Coast of Australia — finding premises, negotiating leases and managing property costs across the full lease lifecycle. Having sat on both sides of the table as landlord and tenant, he negotiates commercial terms most tenants only sign once or twice in the life of their business.
More proof
A bigger office with more parking, a capped personal guarantee and real exit flexibility, on a lease that beat the firm’s existing landlord’s renewal offer.
Lower entry costs, rent-free and fit-out-free startup periods, and personal guarantees cut or removed, so every franchisee opened on solid footing.
A bigger landlord fit-out contribution, an exclusivity clause, limited personal liability and relocation risk removed, all inside two months.
Don't leave tens of thousands a year sitting on the negotiating table. Tell me about the deal and I'll show you where the room to move is, before you sign anything.
