{"id":3602,"date":"2026-07-17T07:10:26","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T07:10:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=3602"},"modified":"2026-07-17T07:10:26","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T07:10:26","slug":"how-apollo-owned-michaels-turned-two-rivals-bankruptcies-into-a-growth-strategy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=3602","title":{"rendered":"How Apollo-owned Michaels turned two rivals\u2019 bankruptcies into a growth strategy"},"content":{"rendered":"
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In a matter of months, Michaels, an arts and crafts retailer, had built out party supply spaces at its 1,400 stores, set up a supply chain to source helium, installed balloon-filling equipment, and trained employees on how to use it. Just as quickly, it started selling much more fabric at 1,000 of its locations after buying JoAnn\u2019s intellectual property and store brands at bankruptcy auction.<\/p>\n

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Michaels can move at \u201crapid speed,\u201d says CEO David Boone, who took the reins in February 2025 and oversaw the inventory expansions. Owned by private equity firm Apollo Global Management, Michaels is unhindered by having to sell Wall Street on the rationale for an acquisition or new strategy.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\u201cIf you want to do things, your board is just a phone call away,\u201d says the 57-year-old Boone who was previously CEO of Staples Canada and held senior jobs at grocer Loblaws and TD Bank. \u201cYou can make decisions much quicker and do things that are more profound and maybe not as easily explainable to the public markets.\u201d<\/p>\n

Michaels\u2019 party supplies and fabrics push is more than opportunism; it\u2019s the centerpiece of its strategy to find growth beyond a maturing arts-and-crafts market, where the retailer has spent a decade fighting Hobby Lobby for market share.<\/p>\n

As a private company, Michaels is not bound to disclose financial results publicly, but media reports suggest Boone\u2019s moves are paying off: Bloomberg reported last week that Michaels saw first quarter sales and adjusted earnings grow by a double-digit percentage, citing people familiar with the matter.<\/p>\n

Before that, Michaels had experienced a decade of stagnation, with annual revenue stuck at around $5 billion, according to the National Retail Federation, and had repeatedly failed to narrow the gap with arch-rival Hobby Lobby, which was about $1 billion bigger by revenue. (Hobby Lobby is also privately held and does not disclose its financial results.) In 2021, Michaels agreed to be bought by Apollo in a $5 billion deal with the goal of becoming a nimbler chain with more appealing stores.<\/p>\n

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Immediately after the acquisition, former Michaels CEO Ashley Buchanan focused his efforts on improving the store\u2019s e-commerce, streamlining its assortment, and making stores easier to shop. (Ashley left for Kohl\u2019s in early 2025 but lost that job after just four months on suspicions he had directed company business to his romantic partner.)\u00a0<\/p>\n

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But it was clear that Michaels needed more. \u201cWe spent a lot of time building out a lot of great digital infrastructure, but clearly not enough on stores and the store experience and that\u2019s where we\u2019ve shifted all of our capital in the past 12 months,\u201d says Boone.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Zhuzhing up stores has included adding \u2018party shops\u2019 with balloons, flowers, and greeting cards to bolster Michaels\u2019 ambitions to be a \u2018celebrations\u2019 retailer as much as it is an arts and crafts chain. Party City\u2019s stores were notoriously poorly maintained, and Boone sees an opportunity for Michaels to lure party supply shoppers with an inviting in-person experience. Michaels has also installed in-store kiosks where shoppers can experiment with art and jewelry-making supplies.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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The retailer is deferring to regional managers to ramp up local selections. For instance, Michaels sells bachelorette decorations in Nashville and horse-themed decor in Calgary, Alberta, home to the Stampede rodeo.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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All this adds up to a revived retailer that Boone thinks can be much bigger. Both Joann and Party City were $2 billion-a-year businesses, and he expects Michaels to grab a good chunk of those markets to generate growth.<\/p>\n

Michaels has been in private equity hands for five years, just shy of the idustry\u2019s typical seven-year cycle for seeking an exit. Naturally, Michaels is facing questions about going public again. \u201cApollo has owned Michaels for a while and will likely want to realize that investment at some point, but our main focus is on delivering the best experience for our customers,\u201d said Boone, when asked about a potential IPO. (Michaels has been on and off the stock market a number of times in its history: it went public in 2014 before going private seven years later.)<\/p>\n

Boone says ownership structure is secondary to focusing on fundamentals. \u201cI always tell people that the customer has no clue who owns the company and doesn\u2019t care,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s almost irrelevant as long as you\u2019re delivering for the customer.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The arts and crafts chain is now a big player in the party supplies and fabrics markets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3601,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[68],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chief-executive-officer-ceo"],"yoast_head":"\nHow Apollo-owned Michaels turned two rivals\u2019 bankruptcies into a growth strategy - Cross Country Moving Team<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=3602\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How Apollo-owned Michaels turned two rivals\u2019 bankruptcies into a growth strategy - 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