Rebalancing the Retail Landscape with REV

For Retail Ecommerce Ventures, a retail-focused private equity firm, the year 2020 wasn’t really about resilience or survival. It was about opportunity. While the rest of us were buying hand sanitizer and PlayStations, REV was buying the assets, IP and trademarks of struggling legacy retailers—and reinventing them for the changing 21st century landscape. 

For a certain population of 40-somethings, the name Waldenbooks conjures warm memories of the 1980s, when an afternoon at the local mall almost certainly involved a stop inside the small bookstore to grab the latest “Baby-Sitter’s Club” release or “Garfield” comic.

Unfortunately, the bookseller is now nothing but a memory—albeit one invoked with surprising regularity in Twitter nostalgia threads.

That’s because it was shuttered long before Retail Ecommerce Ventures, LLC (REV) founders Alex Mehr and Tai Lopez arrived on the scene. These talented e-commerce entrepreneurs are on a mission to save beloved retail brands from oblivion, creating a second life for them online.

For REV, then, the year 2020 wasn’t really about resilience or survival. It was about opportunity.

While the rest of us were buying hand sanitizer and PlayStations, REV was buying the assets, IP and trademarks of struggling legacy retailers—and reinventing them for the changing 21st century landscape. As The Wall Street Journal reported in November, REV’s recent acquisitions include RadioShack, Pier 1 Imports and the trademark assets of Modell’s Sporting Goods. Its portfolio collection also includes Dressbarn, Linens N’ Things, and The Franklin Mint.

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