. >>> let's talk about hudson's bay, the company is expected to complete the acquisition of retailer later today. >> reporter: good morning, becky. i'm here at saks fifth avenueeo of hudson's bay company. an early congratulations on the deal today. let's get started off with why saks. how important was real estate as we sit here and sort of the crown jewel of saks? >> well, saks was very important and relevant for us and something we worked on really since 2006 for three primary reasons. first, we had an opportunity to grow saks into canada, hudson bay company is the dominant department store company in canada and through our infrastructure we'll be able to open six or seven stores, very robust online saks in canada. so that's a road map to growth that wasn't available to saks previously. additionally, we have about $100 million a year of synergies between the two companies. these two companies share a lot of the same dna and have a lot of the same principles and structure allowing us to really take advantage of the $100 million synergies. additionally, we now have enough real estate and enough ebitda that would allow us to create a reit which would really gi