Top Retail Broker Assembles New Team

Less than a year later, Scardino's Affinity Commercial Real Estate has landed its seventh company for tenant representation in the Cheddar's restaurant chain. It joins Atlanta Bread, Hertz, Modern Self Defense, Red Robin, Slender Lady and Verizon. Affinity Commercial Real Estate, or ACRE, also is working to sell some Burger King outlets, in addition to more than a dozen land and shopping center listings.

The 17-year industry veteran, involved in his family's restaurants in north suburban Round Lake before going into commercial real estate, had been spending most of his time at Grubb & Ellis doing retail land sales, most notably a for a Super Wal-Mart in Antioch, a Home Depot in Round Lake Beach as well as the 140-acre Chicago Premium Outlets in Aurora, set to open in May.

He left Grubb & Ellis, a firm traditionally stronger in the industrial and office sectors, on good terms.

"A lot of principles and disciplines I learned at Grubb, I've put into place here," says Scardino, whose office overlooks retail mecca Woodfield Mall. "It was a terrific company to work for, it was a terrific foundation and it was a terrific culture."

One of those principles is evident on the company's accumulation of tenant rep accounts. "At Grubb & Ellis, we didn't want to do 100 one-off deals a year," he explains. "We'd rather do 100% of the deals for five people."

Scardino's team includes 20-year commercial veteran Robert A. Zacharias, most recently president of Maxim Realty Group, and Brad C. Ratajczak, who worked with his boss in his first two years in commercial real estate at Grubb & Ellis. Ratajczak also is handling expansions efforts by Atlanta Bread, Hertz and Verizon.

Michelle L. Gassensmith and Tracey E. Witte are new to the business, but bring 20 years each of corporate world experience, including sales and management posts with companies such as AT&T and Kemper Life.

Another tenet for Scardino's team is community involvement. A member of Round Lake's planning and zoning board at 21, Scardino is a member of his local elementary district's educational excellence foundation. Likewise, Witte is serving on her school district's superintendent search committee while Gassensmith hopes to land a seat on her suburb's economic development commission.