Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Predicting the demise of Sears & Kmart since 2017!
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Re: Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Post by Romr123 »

Kansas City, though, also has Dillards, which has the extremities of the city covered (St. Joseph, KCN, Independence and JoCo)...Michigan lives with the legacy of Hudson's dominance up here which left us slightly understored compared to other regions, which crowded out any expansion in the day except for Jacobsons (which has translated into a few Von Maur and Nordstrom locations)
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Re: Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Post by arizonaguy »

Romr123 wrote: January 13th, 2022, 3:56 pm Kansas City, though, also has Dillards, which has the extremities of the city covered (St. Joseph, KCN, Independence and JoCo)...Michigan lives with the legacy of Hudson's dominance up here which left us slightly understored compared to other regions, which crowded out any expansion in the day except for Jacobsons (which has translated into a few Von Maur and Nordstrom locations)
I'm actually surprised that the Macy's at Oakland Mall has hung on so far as it seems weird for Macy's to have 2 stores in Troy (Oakland Mall and Somerset). Although it probably is a toss up between Oakland Mall or Lakeside as to what is the healthiest mall east of I-75 (it appears Oakland is better stored but Lakeside is in a much better location demographic wise but suffers from having the Partridge Creek mall almost next door). If Macy's was in the business of long term survival I'd say that Macy's should close its Lakeside store and move a few miles down the road to Partridge Creek (where they have a choice of the former Nordstrom or former Carson's).
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Re: Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Post by Romr123 »

Oakland actually does have a different demographic than Somerset, for all its proximity, and to it's benefit. Relatively little cross-shopping occurs. Oakland gets the Sterling Heights Chaldean multigenerational family shopping visits, and always got more than it's share of the Windsor, ON cross-border shopping trips (it is right on I-75, in the middle of a big-box area with Target/Best Buy/Costco/BB&B/Barnes and Noble/ABC Appliance) plus is an enormous store, four levels with all departments (including a restaurant which only closed with COVID) which won't be easy to subdivide. The mall still has JCPenney and atHome and is still viable. This is the "shopping as task" mall.

Somerset is the Class AA mall, bustling and upscale, with an abbreviated Macy's (200k sqft as opposed to 450k sqft--no furniture; limited home) along with Neiman, Saks and Nordstrom. Limited big box shopping nearby (and what's there is a different, more upscale selection of big box--REI/Nordstrom Rack/etc). This is "shopping as entertainment" mall.

Dayton-Hudson was verrrry judicious in their mall development/store development, plus we didn't have a particularly viable department store competitor in Michigan so we didn't have the proliferation of charmless class B malls that other big metros did. If anything, we had a little too much supply on the upscale side (Saks went way back to the 30s in downtown Detroit and expanded into the suburbs in the 70s/Jacobsons/Neiman-Marcus/Nordstrom).

Lakeside/Partridge Creek is a shi$show...Lakeside was essentially a duplicate of 12 Oaks just 30 miles away with Hudsons/Crowleys/Sears/Penney/L&T. Macy's is dual-located; Sears/L&T are empty. Partridge Creek opened about 12 years ago about 5 miles away as an open-air (!) mall (not a lifestyle center--traditional dumbbell mall construction with surrounding parking) with a theatre, Nordstrom, and Parisian right before absorption by Bon-Ton. It went in assuming that incomes and development were going to continue to expand outward/eastward, and that really hasn't happened as the city of Detroit has rebounded.

About the least worst outcome here is for Lakeside to be demalled and a significant amount of senior housing to be placed there (it is a good location for that, albeit not on the Interstate) and Partridge to absorb the remaining viable parts of the mall including a Macy's.
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Re: Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Post by arizonaguy »

Romr123 wrote: January 14th, 2022, 5:26 am Oakland actually does have a different demographic than Somerset, for all its proximity, and to it's benefit. Relatively little cross-shopping occurs. Oakland gets the Sterling Heights Chaldean multigenerational family shopping visits, and always got more than it's share of the Windsor, ON cross-border shopping trips (it is right on I-75, in the middle of a big-box area with Target/Best Buy/Costco/BB&B/Barnes and Noble/ABC Appliance) plus is an enormous store, four levels with all departments (including a restaurant which only closed with COVID) which won't be easy to subdivide. The mall still has JCPenney and atHome and is still viable. This is the "shopping as task" mall.

Somerset is the Class AA mall, bustling and upscale, with an abbreviated Macy's (200k sqft as opposed to 450k sqft--no furniture; limited home) along with Neiman, Saks and Nordstrom. Limited big box shopping nearby (and what's there is a different, more upscale selection of big box--REI/Nordstrom Rack/etc). This is "shopping as entertainment" mall.

Dayton-Hudson was verrrry judicious in their mall development/store development, plus we didn't have a particularly viable department store competitor in Michigan so we didn't have the proliferation of charmless class B malls that other big metros did. If anything, we had a little too much supply on the upscale side (Saks went way back to the 30s in downtown Detroit and expanded into the suburbs in the 70s/Jacobsons/Neiman-Marcus/Nordstrom).

Lakeside/Partridge Creek is a shi$show...Lakeside was essentially a duplicate of 12 Oaks just 30 miles away with Hudsons/Crowleys/Sears/Penney/L&T. Macy's is dual-located; Sears/L&T are empty. Partridge Creek opened about 12 years ago about 5 miles away as an open-air (!) mall (not a lifestyle center--traditional dumbbell mall construction with surrounding parking) with a theatre, Nordstrom, and Parisian right before absorption by Bon-Ton. It went in assuming that incomes and development were going to continue to expand outward/eastward, and that really hasn't happened as the city of Detroit has rebounded.

About the least worst outcome here is for Lakeside to be demalled and a significant amount of senior housing to be placed there (it is a good location for that, albeit not on the Interstate) and Partridge to absorb the remaining viable parts of the mall including a Macy's.
Thanks for the update. My firsthand knowledge of Michigan malls revolves around 12 Oaks, Fairlane, Great Lakes Crossing, and the long gone Summit Place (I lived in Michigan during the late 1980s - early 1990s and regularly went back there until the late 2000s).

The last time I was in the Lakeside area, Partridge Creek wasn't even there. It just seems like Lakeside would be a good redevelopment option and anything still at Lakeside should move there especially since google maps states that they are only 1.8 miles apart. It would give Macy's a continued presence in northern Macomb county (where most of my affluent Italian relatives seem to live).
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Re: Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Post by buckguy »

I'd forgotten how Hudson's had really dominated the Detroit area, particularly because of how involved they were in developing early malls. I never went to a Crowley's or their even lesser competition, Demery's to know what those were like. I do remember Federal's which was the kind of store that was squeezed by discounters and Penney's, Sears and Wards---Federal's and Ward's seemed to have a number of C-grade malls or other shopping centers. We had Federal's in Cleveland. Jacobson's seemed like more of a boutique operator. It seemed odd that Detroit attracted multiple Lord & Taylor's and in locations that made no sense for them like Fairlane. I could see Saks because of history and Nordstrom because they eventually went everywhere but L&T seemed like they made more sense for Chicago and maybe could have had a store in Cleveland.

In many ways its a blessing to not be overmalled. I was in Cleveland (which was overmalled early) recently and saw two of the more healthy survivors---Beachwood Place (the AA mall) and South Park (the last of the mid-market malls to be built). They both are nearly fully tenanted, but have a lot of no-name places. Beachwood has to compete with 2 lifestyle developments and although South Park killed off Parmatown (a 50s strip turned mall) and Southland (a collection of strips---once the highest sales tax revenue census tract in the state), there's clearly more traffic at the big box place across the street which includes Costco. Great Lakes Mall seems to be in free fall despite new restaurants and a Dick's and Great Northern (near a huge, popular lifestyle development) seems to be on a similar trajectory.

Places where it has been difficult to build new malls like the DC area (no new class A malls since the late 80s) and LA seem to have far less in the way of dead malls and not all of the dead places have been bulldozed for Walmarts. White Flint, which had endless litigation with Lord & Taylor (which still stands) had to scrap plans for redevelopment and it's probably a good thing for the area because they will have less retail in the next iteration of their plans.
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Re: Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Post by Bakeragr »

Just to tie a few parts of this conversation together, of the three remaining Macy's in the KC area, one was originally a Jacobson's (Town Center Plaza, Leawood) and one was originally a Montgomery Wards (Oak Park Mall, Overland Park). Both became The Jones Store before Macy's. Both of those malls are in great shape and are in affluent Johnson County, KS.
The third Macy's is at what was Metro North Mall. The whole mall has been demolished and the Macy's still stands. I am thinking it was one of the best locations in the Jones Store chain and still survives due to a lot of loyal customers that live out in the country and come into the "City" to do their shopping. There are a lot of big box stores nearby. A nearby lifestyle center Zona Rosa, really killed Metro North, and Dillards signed a deal at one point that made them the exclusive department store there, I believe.

It kind of surprises me that the Lee's Summit store is closing, because that is a good community to be in. However, I've been in that store and it was built by May Co. at the end of its run. It and the Famous-Barr they built in Columbia, MO in the early 2000's were just not merchandised right and didn't quite have what their shoppers wanted. It doesn't seem like Macy's was ever able to merchandize them right. Many of those locations May Co. built at the end have already been closed.
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Re: Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Post by arizonaguy »

Bakeragr wrote: January 14th, 2022, 7:27 am Just to tie a few parts of this conversation together, of the three remaining Macy's in the KC area, one was originally a Jacobson's (Town Center Plaza, Leawood) and one was originally a Montgomery Wards (Oak Park Mall, Overland Park). Both became The Jones Store before Macy's. Both of those malls are in great shape and are in affluent Johnson County, KS.
The third Macy's is at what was Metro North Mall. The whole mall has been demolished and the Macy's still stands. I am thinking it was one of the best locations in the Jones Store chain and still survives due to a lot of loyal customers that live out in the country and come into the "City" to do their shopping. There are a lot of big box stores nearby. A nearby lifestyle center Zona Rosa, really killed Metro North, and Dillards signed a deal at one point that made them the exclusive department store there, I believe.

It kind of surprises me that the Lee's Summit store is closing, because that is a good community to be in. However, I've been in that store and it was built by May Co. at the end of its run. It and the Famous-Barr they built in Columbia, MO in the early 2000's were just not merchandised right and didn't quite have what their shoppers wanted. It doesn't seem like Macy's was ever able to merchandize them right. Many of those locations May Co. built at the end have already been closed.
Geographically, if Macy's was going to kill off Metro North and Lee's Summit, they should've kept Independence open.

Metro North, Lee's Summit, and Independence were all on the Neighborhood Stores list and Lee's Summit and Independence have closed. If Metro North closes, as expected, Macy's will be an afterthought for most of the Missouri side of the metro area.

More of a retail history aspect but it's amazing that about 15 years ago Macy's had the following stores all clumped together in Johnson County:

Prairie Village (now closed)
Metcalf South (now closed)
Oak Park
Town Center
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Re: Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Post by Blueboy8 »

So I am wondering why the Missouri side of KC metro is now devoid of Macy’s. I was shocked to see Lee’s Summit closing. I thought the smaller stores were more attractive? That will leave just Dillards on that side of the metro. I would think at least one Macy’s would survive. Independence also shocked me when it closed.
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Re: Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Post by Romr123 »

Jacobson's seemed like more of a boutique operator. It seemed odd that Detroit attracted multiple Lord & Taylor's and in locations that made no sense for them like Fairlane. I could see Saks because of history and Nordstrom because they eventually went everywhere but L&T seemed like they made more sense for Chicago and maybe could have had a store in Cleveland

Jacobson's had the old-line suburban market (think Birmingham/Grosse Pointe) sewn up..

L&T when they came into Detroit in the 70s was part of Associated Dry Goods (ADG)...with LS Ayres to the south in Indiana, but not having any particular reason to expand northward into Michigan, and mid-70s malls going in (Fairlane/Lakeside/Twelve Oaks), it let the mall operators diversify a bit with a national nameplate.

Hudson's did some interesting strip-center development pre-Dayton-Hudson/Target--in the mid to late 60s they expanded the Hudson's Budget Store into stand-alone stores in strip centers near but not adjacent to their existing mall stores. I've got an old Life Magazine with a local advertising insertion for them selling carpeting in locations like Madison Heights (12/John R), Lincoln Park, Livonia in addition to the mall stores. Allowed them to co-exist with Kresge/K-Mart, Korvettes, and kept out most other non-local discount competitors (Target didn't come in to Michigan until roughly 1990, and Meijer didn't invade SE Michigan until the very late 80s).
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Re: Macy's Closing More Stores? (Later in 2022 or in 2023?)

Post by buckguy »

The freestanding budget stores seem to date from the late 50s/early 60s, so the intent may have been to compete with discounters but I don't think Hudson's budget stores kept out national discounters---they had Topp's, Zayre's, Arlans, and Spartan-Atlantic. Budget store merchandise would have been a step up from the stuff at most of these places and more comparable to Federal's. They changed the name to Rainbow stores for awhile, but phased them out, along with their in-store budget stores when everyone else did in the late 70s/early 80s.

Lazarus, in Columbus did something similar with its Capri shops in Columbus. They bought the Boston Store locations when their parent, Federal's, folded and converted those to budget stores. By then, though, Columbus had all the usual discount chains and the Capris didn't last long.
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