Fred Meyer Jewelers looking at shopping centers, not malls

[SamSpade]

Staying with the company real estate, I suppose in all these Kroger Marketplaces that are being built; since they already still in the Fred Meyer stores (most locations), Smith's Marketplace stores and ???
http://www.jckonline.com/2016/06/30/fre ... ther-malls

[Super S]

I have been noticing that they seem to be gradually disappearing from malls. They also have been running a lot of radio advertising lately.

[Brian Lutz]

Fred Meyer Jewelers has always run quite a bit of radio advertising in the Seattle market (not quite as much as Shane Co. does though). I'm only aware of one former mall location for them in this area though (the one that used to be in Southcenter Mall next to the JCPenney) and I don't believe they have any stores around here that aren't inside Fred Meyer stores (in fact a search for all stores within a 30 mile radius of Seattle shows that all of them are inside Fred Meyer stores.)

[storewanderer]

I've seen some of these in malls as I go from place to place. I can't really think of where... they don't seem to be going into new malls. Most of the malls they are in seem to be mature B and C malls. They have not opened in new malls or new lifestyle centers, or downtowns that would be considered more A locations.

Not real sure how they run or what type of store they are but outward they appear to handle fairly nice product. A step up from what a standard department store has, for sure. I am not entirely sure if inside a Kroger Marketplace is the right venue for that type of product or if they are tinkering things downward to fit their venue better.

[Brian Lutz]

The way I would describe Fred Meyer Jewelers is that they're a full-fledged jewelry store with a separate space of their own inside the store (usually right next to an entrance, and with different hours from the rest of the store) albeit not quite in the same league as the big-name mall jewelers like Kay, Zales or Ben Bridge. Their product isn't quite as nice (they emphasize "value" diamonds like $1,500 1-carat stones that generally doesn't come with any sort of certification but also have some "name brand" higher end products as well) and the overall product mix is well beyond a department store jewelry counter, but generally still focuses on cheaper pieces overall than you'd find at the mall jewelers.

[pseudo3d]

The only Fred Meyer Jewelers stores I know of, at least in the South, are inside Kroger stores, and frankly, I'm not sure how, or if, they make any money. I don't think they really work with the existing Kroger Marketplace merchandise mix. Maybe they might work better if it was an externally-accessed location...