Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Predicting the demise of Sears & Kmart since 2017!
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Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Post by TheBigSmall »

Macys is closing 10 stores in January 2022 as part of the plan to close 125 stores by 2023. About 65 have closed between 2020 and 2021. The reason is because Macy's is closing less stores this year is because "digital performance is stronger in markets where they have stores". However, it is reported that Macys is taking a 2nd look at the remaining 60 stores that were slated to go dark by 2023. So this could possibly mean stores that were on the list could be taken off if their performance is improving. Or vice versa, stores that were not on the list could be added if their performance drops off.
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Re: Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Post by Alpha8472 »

Macy's is shrewd. If they give advanced warning, some of these malls may offer a discount on rent to make Macy's stay. Some of those malls will be doomed if they lose a major anchor such as Macy's. Many malls are barely hanging on. Once Macy's leaves the malls will get little traffic.
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Re: Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Post by ClownLoach »

One of these is Mission Viejo, CA. It has already been in the news recently that they will consolidate the two stores at the mall into one. They are already meeting with the City Council about this closure. They are keeping the building that currently houses the Men's store - it is smaller than the main Women's store but it's a newer brighter building. The Women's store will be torn down to build a new housing element within the mall property. Considering that it looks like neither store has received a single box of product in months and you could open an ice skating rink on floor 2 of the men's store I think this will be a easy consolidation with no layoffs.

I wonder how many more of these malls with multiple Macy's buildings will keep both stores? They don't seem to have enough assortment left to need two full size buildings as they have in some malls.

In this currently growing market - Macy's had 4 stores just a few years ago - a new built store in Irvine, a old store in Laguna Hills, and the two in Mission Viejo. Irvine has been gone for about 5 years (I don't think it made it a full decade? It was too small and had missing departments). Laguna Hills was taken down with its mall which is now out of business and the redevelopment is now going to be non retail (residential only). This consolidation will leave them with one store. This seems like the right approach as they were terribly overstored here.
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Re: Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Post by Super S »

Alpha8472 wrote: December 3rd, 2021, 9:31 pm Macy's is shrewd. If they give advanced warning, some of these malls may offer a discount on rent to make Macy's stay. Some of those malls will be doomed if they lose a major anchor such as Macy's. Many malls are barely hanging on. Once Macy's leaves the malls will get little traffic.
This is the case for Lloyd Center in Portland. While Macy's leaving wasn't the only factor, the departure of remaining stores has accelerated and the mall is being foreclosed. I expect the mall to be shut down after the holidays.
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Re: Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Post by timanny »

Alpha8472 wrote: December 3rd, 2021, 9:31 pm Macy's is shrewd. If they give advanced warning, some of these malls may offer a discount on rent to make Macy's stay. Some of those malls will be doomed if they lose a major anchor such as Macy's. Many malls are barely hanging on. Once Macy's leaves the malls will get little traffic.
West Valley Mall in Tracy, CA is like this. Macy's was paid to fill the former Gottschalks space. They had to agree to stay ten years, and that was in 2010. Sears, JCPenney, and Barnes and Noble are gone, with Hobby Lobby in the Penney's space. Once Macy's closes, the mall should be flipped inside out and become an outdoor center, leaving Target, Hobby Lobby, and Cinemark, and reconfiguring Big 5 with an outside entrance. That mall should NEVER have been built; the town was too small in 1995 to support a traditional indoor mall, and most mall retailers wouldn't touch it. Tracy is big enough now, but the mall is so lacking that people still drive over the hill to Pleasanton or the other direction to Modesto.
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Re: Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Post by BillyGr »

ClownLoach wrote: December 4th, 2021, 12:44 am I wonder how many more of these malls with multiple Macy's buildings will keep both stores? They don't seem to have enough assortment left to need two full size buildings as they have in some malls.

In this currently growing market - Macy's had 4 stores just a few years ago - a new built store in Irvine, a old store in Laguna Hills, and the two in Mission Viejo. Irvine has been gone for about 5 years (I don't think it made it a full decade? It was too small and had missing departments). Laguna Hills was taken down with its mall which is now out of business and the redevelopment is now going to be non retail (residential only). This consolidation will leave them with one store. This seems like the right approach as they were terribly overstored here.
That was probably the case in many places, given all the other chains they have taken over in the last seeral decades.

For instance, here in the Albany (NY) area, they for years had one store. That store was rebuilt and expanded to 3 floors (while the rest of the mall only had 2, and the old store became more mall space).
Then they started taking over chains like Filenes/Jordan Marsh and suddenly had stores in just about every mall in the region (and the issue of 2 in the other big mall which had both of those chains).

While they likely gained a few customers at those other stores, it's just as likely that most of the customers simply started going to a closer location rather than the existing one they had gone to previously.

Now, over the years they have closed most of the stores, leaving just the original and I believe one in the other big mall, so that has to help cut costs while still keeping the majority of shoppers coming to the main locations (if they haven't switched to ordering online, that is).
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Re: Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Post by TW-Upstate NY »

BillyGr wrote: December 4th, 2021, 9:52 am Now, over the years they have closed most of the stores, leaving just the original and I believe one in the other big mall, so that has to help cut costs while still keeping the majority of shoppers coming to the main locations (if they haven't switched to ordering online, that is).
Which would be Colonie Center, which opened with the mall in the 60's and is the larger of the two and Crossgates which (and correct me if I'm wrong Billy) I think was originally Jordan Marsh or Filene's. The problem I see with this strategy is these two stores are very close to each other and so far have escaped the axe but I could see them going back to one very large store as it was for probably 30+ years after they first arrived here.
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Re: Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Post by storewanderer »

timanny wrote: December 4th, 2021, 8:15 am

West Valley Mall in Tracy, CA is like this. Macy's was paid to fill the former Gottschalks space. They had to agree to stay ten years, and that was in 2010. Sears, JCPenney, and Barnes and Noble are gone, with Hobby Lobby in the Penney's space. Once Macy's closes, the mall should be flipped inside out and become an outdoor center, leaving Target, Hobby Lobby, and Cinemark, and reconfiguring Big 5 with an outside entrance. That mall should NEVER have been built; the town was too small in 1995 to support a traditional indoor mall, and most mall retailers wouldn't touch it. Tracy is big enough now, but the mall is so lacking that people still drive over the hill to Pleasanton or the other direction to Modesto.
Well it is more than 10 years and that Tracy Macy's is still open (in the sense that the doors are unlocked... lots of open space in there... moreso than some of the other locations I've gone to that are on the Neighborhood Store program).

I wonder if a better approach in this type of situation may be for Macy's to run a 20k square foot Backstage Store in Tracy that offers in-stock pick up and will pull items from nearby stores to facilitate the pick ups.

I also think Kohl's and increased Target locations in the area (Lathrop) impacted that mall in Tracy quite adversely. Also JC Penney has that newer freestanding store in Manteca... sort of a weird area for department stores. I think this impacts the radius the Tracy Mall draws from.

The old Macy's West had a much different mentality toward how many stores they should have, than the current Macy's Corporation has. When Tracy opened, that was a Macy's West project, perhaps the last one (or maybe taking the newer Gottschalk's in Fresno was their last project). Hence the crazy number of locations in CA, even in places that made no sense like Tracy and Antioch.

I am also somewhat curious about Macy's in Downtown Sacramento. There isn't really any retail left surrounding the store, yet Macy's has that store fully merchandised now (generously considering that the 3rd floor with about 1/4 of it furniture is good use of the space) including a large Backstage area. This store seems to be merchandised better now than it was 10 years ago when there was more retail around it. Clearly they are focusing on this store which I find curious given how many other downtown stores they've closed and given there is not much other retail around it. Not knowing what is going to happen with Sunrise Mall, it appears Macy's may have itself in a bit of a bad situation in Sacramento. The store at Roseville is newer and well positioned, the store at Arden is old and small and poorly merchandised, and the Downtown store is definitely big and well merchandised but out of the usual retail zone and has parking issues whenever there is an event down there which is often. They probably need to add a couple more stores elsewhere around Sacramento.
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Re: Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Post by DFWRetaileWatcher »

timanny wrote: December 4th, 2021, 8:15 am
Alpha8472 wrote: December 3rd, 2021, 9:31 pm Macy's is shrewd. If they give advanced warning, some of these malls may offer a discount on rent to make Macy's stay. Some of those malls will be doomed if they lose a major anchor such as Macy's. Many malls are barely hanging on. Once Macy's leaves the malls will get little traffic.
West Valley Mall in Tracy, CA is like this. Macy's was paid to fill the former Gottschalks space. They had to agree to stay ten years, and that was in 2010. Sears, JCPenney, and Barnes and Noble are gone, with Hobby Lobby in the Penney's space. Once Macy's closes, the mall should be flipped inside out and become an outdoor center, leaving Target, Hobby Lobby, and Cinemark, and reconfiguring Big 5 with an outside entrance. That mall should NEVER have been built; the town was too small in 1995 to support a traditional indoor mall, and most mall retailers wouldn't touch it. Tracy is big enough now, but the mall is so lacking that people still drive over the hill to Pleasanton or the other direction to Modesto.
Ah yes, you had to love the real estate bubble...
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Re: Macy's Closing 10 Stores in January 2022

Post by Alpha8472 »

The very posh outdoor mall called Broadway Plaza Walnut Creek, California had 2 Macy's up until a few years ago. One was a former I. Magnin and the other was an Emporium Capwell. That mall is so successful that the sales are out of control. The customers are rich and the stores are crowded. However, Macy's consolidated the Men's store into the main Women's store. Neiman Marcus at the mall recently went out of business only a couple of years ago. It seems like it was only open a few years. So some retailers can't seem to make it while others seem to thrive.

Two cities over at Sunvalley Mall in Concord, California they also have 2 Macy's stores with one being a former Emporium Capwell. Those two stores do decent business, but it seems like Macy's would want to close one. There is not enough room to combine the merchandise into one store.
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