GlassRatner Expands Retail Practice With Antony Karabus

GlassRatner has appointed veteran retail advisor Antony Karabus as Executive Advisor, with a mandate to help expand the firm’s retail restructuring and turnaround practice. Drawing on decades of experience advising retailers across Canada and the US, Karabus joins the firm at a time when the sector continues to face pressure from shifting consumer behaviour, rising costs and changing capital needs. Antony spoke with us about why the role appealed to him, what he hopes to help build at GlassRatner and where he sees the retail market heading. Allan Nackan, Senior Managing Director, who co-leads the restructuring practice at GlassRatner in Canada, also weighed in on why the firm wanted to partner with Antony and why retail is an area it believes is worth investing in.

1. Antony, you’ve spent much of your career advising retailers on strategy, performance improvement, turnaround and transformation. Why did joining GlassRatner in this new Executive Advisor role make sense for you at this point in your career?  

My partner and I had sold our retail consulting firm to Accenture in 2021. After retiring from the firm in 2025, I decided to spend my time working with well-respected, like-minded firms that were keen to deepen the amount of business they do with retail-related companies. It was essential for me to work with firms where we are culturally aligned and like each other.

2. What do you hope to help build at GlassRatner, and where do you see the biggest opportunity for the firm to expand its work with retailers facing operational or financial pressure? 

I hope to augment the strong talent at GlassRatner and help grow the profile of the firm in the retail and related lending community.  Based on where retail is at the moment, we see lots of scope to support distressed and underperforming retailers, mall operators and their lenders with tailored advisory and restructuring advice.

3. You’ve advised retailers in both Canada and the US. What are you seeing in the retail market right now, and where do you think the greatest pressures will emerge over the next couple of years? 

There is a tremendous decline in consumer confidence and a tightening of affordability on both sides of the border. In addition to leaning on expensive credit card debt, consumers at record levels are accessing their home equity loans and savings and new types of debt such as buy now, pay later to fund retail spending, which I think is leading consumers to a very difficult place. The vast majority of consumers have little budget available for discretionary spending, while the well-off are continuing to spend and hold up overall consumer spending. Even the well-off are drawing from their investment accounts to fund retail spending. This reality will increasingly put downward pressure on retail spending, which is going to make it harder for retailers in the middle. Also, a significant percentage (as much as 20% plus) of retail sales are moving to digital from physical stores, which is increasing competition for retail dollars all over the world away from just local or regional stores. Lastly, there is a major shift of retail market share from medium-sized retailers to Walmart, Costco, Amazon and various Off-Price retailers, most of whom are off-mall. This is further pressuring enclosed shopping centres as literally tens of billions of sales that would previously have taken place in enclosed shopping centres have now been migrating to these mass retailers who are located off-mall.

4. Retail restructuring has traditionally been associated with store closures, lease exits and balance-sheet fixes. How has the work changed, and what will retailers increasingly need from turnaround and restructuring advisors going forward? 

I have always believed that many retailers might have avoided formal proceedings under CCAA or Chapter 11 and then liquidation, if they had used advisors with deep retail strategic and operational expertise who would better understand whether the retailer was facing an existential crisis or simply a blip in the road. When engaged earlier, we have helped a number of retailers return to profitability with a stronger operating business model (thus saving jobs and avoiding pain to creditors, landlords and vendors).  This also avoided the pain, disruption and high cost of CCAA or Chapter 11.

5. Allan, why did GlassRatner want to partner with Antony, and what does his retail experience add to the capabilities you are building at the firm?

Our relationship with Antony goes back about 20 years. We have watched him and his partners build an outstanding retail consulting firm on two platforms – first as Karabus Management and then HRC Retail Advisory, which was sold to Accenture in 2021.

Our team and Antony are strongly aligned culturally and in our approaches to dealing with complex business challenges, and we are excited to integrate Antony’s 35+ years of retail specialization with GlassRatner’s restructuring, litigation support, human capital and other offerings.

With an integrated team of more than 300 restructuring and other staff across Canada, the US and Mexico, we routinely stabilize businesses, manage liquidity, run court processes, refinance, sell or liquidate assets, and negotiate with lenders, landlords and other stakeholders. Most financial advisory firms do not offer the depth of retail strategic and operational insight that Antony brings around retail P&L composition and benchmarking, merchandising, inventory productivity, store economics and channel cost structures. Combining that with our experience acting as monitor, receiver, proposal trustee, financial advisor and CRO on both sides of the border gives lenders, sponsors, boards and their counsel a compelling proposition under one roof.

6. Why is retail an area where GlassRatner believes it is important to invest right now, and what opportunities are you seeing in the restructuring and turnaround market?

Since being acquired by TorQuest Partners in July 2025, we are very focused on expanding our teams and building deep sector expertise where it makes sense.

Retail distress is structural. Current trends impacting the sector include trade and tariff uncertainty, sharply declining consumer confidence on both sides of the border, increasingly value-conscious consumers, and the impact of digital and AI, all of which are creating uncertainty and compressing margins. We have seen a number of retail CCAA filings in 2025 and 2026, including Hudson’s Bay, Comark, Toys “R” Us (Canada), Ssense, and Claire’s to name a few.  Given the challenges faced by many retailers, we expect the sector to continue to be under pressure.

The biggest opportunities we hope to bring to the industry are applying a retail industry business lens and earlier intervention to maximize results. Too many files arrive when the only options left are liquidation or a distressed sale. Our Rapid Retail Diagnostic can give retailers, ABL lenders, special loans groups, private credit and PE sponsors an independent view and pragmatic advice to optimize outcomes and, of course, recoveries.

US retailers face many of the same challenges as in Canada and our firm’s cross-border capabilities, with strong teams in Canada and the US, can support stakeholders from the first diagnostic through implementation and, if necessary, seamlessly transition into a court-driven restructuring process.