We would love to invite you to our first annual distressed retail conference, being held in Toronto on Friday, May 8, 2026. As Canadian retail navigates a period of profound transition, this conference is designed to bring together the people closest to the action for an honest, practical conversation about what is happening, what it means, and where the opportunities are.

Date and Time

Friday, May 8, 2026, 8:30 am to 12:00 pm.

Location

Offices of PwC Canada
18 York Street, Suite 2500
Toronto, Ontario, M5J 0B2

Who Should Attend

This conference is tailored for:

• Retail executives, operators and investors

• Lenders and asset-based lenders with retail exposure

• Commercial bankers and special loans teams

• Real estate advisors and landlords

• Industry consultants, advisors and turnaround professionals

Insolvency professionals should also plan to attend to meet those in the industry and hear firsthand about the issues and dynamics at play in the market.

Spots are limited and will be taken quickly, so please register today to reserve your seat!

Agenda

8:30 – 9:00 | Registration & Light Breakfast

9:00 – 9:30 | Panel 1: The Changing Face of Canadian Retail

Canadian retail is navigating a period of significant disruption. Some formats and categories are holding up well, others are under genuine pressure, and the forces at play are not uniform across the sector. Tariffs, shifting supply chains, changing consumer behaviour and the relentless growth of e-commerce are reshaping the competitive landscape in ways that are affecting some retailers far more than others. This opening panel brings together retail industry insiders to take a clear-eyed look at what is really happening, what is strong, what is not, what is changing, and how to make sense of the current moment in Canadian retail.

9:30 – 10:00 | Networking Break

10:00 – 10:30 | Panel 2: Fixing What Isn’t Working

Not every distressed retailer is destined for a formal insolvency process. This panel examines what it takes to stabilize and turn around a struggling retail business: rightsizing the store footprint, rebuilding vendor relationships, managing liquidity, and making the hard operational decisions that determine whether a business survives. The panel also explores the critical role of the lender in this process, how productive lender relationships are maintained through periods of stress, and what support looks like when a borrower is genuinely trying to find a path forward. Panelists draw on direct experience working with distressed retailers to discuss what works and what doesn't.

10:30 – 10:45 | Fireside Chat: The Retail Insider View

No one has a better read on the state of Canadian retail than the people covering it every day. In this candid conversation, Craig Patterson, Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Retail Insider, dissects what went wrong in some of Canada's most significant retail insolvencies, what the warning signs were, which parts of the sector are quietly struggling beneath the surface, and what the patterns emerging across cases reveal about the structural forces and disruption reshaping the sector. Lessons from the front row.

10:45 – 11:00 | Networking Break

11:00 – 11:30 | Panel 3: When It Becomes Formal

When a struggling retailer runs out of road, everything changes. This panel examines what that moment means in practice: how formal processes are structured, how to choose the right one, the monitor's role, DIP financing and how retailers access emergency liquidity during a proceeding, landlord and lease disclaimer issues, creditor dynamics, lender strategies, and how the tension between keeping the business alive and winding it down plays out in real time. Practical, candid and grounded in recent Canadian experience.

11:30 – 12:00 | Panel 4: The Hard Questions - Roadblocks, Opportunities and What Comes Next

Retail insolvencies in Canada are generating some of the most complex and contested issues in the restructuring market today. This closing panel takes on the harder questions: the value of leasehold interests and how to realize it, cross-border considerations and what US trends mean for Canadian files, the role of intellectual property and brand assets in recovery, who the buyers and assignees are in current processes, and where the real opportunities are for investors, lenders and advisors. A forward-looking conversation to close the morning with a clear view of where the market is headed and where the value is.

CPD

The learning portions of the event will be eligible for CPD credit for both lawyers and accountants.

Pricing

Complimentary admission for retail executives, landlords, real estate professionals, investors and lenders actively working in the Canadian retail sector.

$249 for restructuring professionals, insolvency lawyers, trustees, consultants and advisors.

We very much hope that you can join us for this morning. And please do pass along the invitation to your colleagues. We'd love for them to join as well!

Just make sure to register right away as the spots will be taken quickly. Registration can be done in under a minute.

Looking forward to seeing you!

Dina Kovacevic
Editor-in-Chief
Insolvency Insider

Sponsors

Thanks to our generous sponsors for making this conference possible: