Update as of 8/30/2019 this store is now slated to close.
Here is the Sears at Sunrise Mall in Corpus Christi Texas. Sunrise Mall will be featured at a later time on the blog along with a video walkthrough. This store has survived the bankruptcy store closings and store closing list of August 2019. Sears is the last original anchor remaining at the mall. On my visits to the mall to and from McAllen, Sears was in bankruptcy and the future of the company was very bleak. As we all know now, the company survived bankruptcy and continues to operate although with a much smaller store count that will be less than 400 stores total after October 2019.
There are differing reports online that the interior of the mall is now closed, but a few reviews state it is still open. If anyone can verify the status of the mall, please comment below.
Here is the mall entrance. The second floor of the mall is closed off to the public, but you can look into the mall from the Sears entrance up there. More on that below.
As we walk into the store, we have the Women's apparel and shoes.
Just past the apparel is the lawn and garden department.
Several Sears logo crates are above the shelves in this area of the store.
The Toy department has taken up a prime space next to the tools and near the escalators.
I really like the setup in the toy department, it feels like the old school toy department Sears had back in the 1980's.
A Sears Grand basket. The Sears Grand near Austin closed in 2018. Baskets from that store have been spread out to a few different Sears locations.
One of the escalators was broken on my visit. The elevator is in a strange spot next to the mall entrances.
Here is the second floor mall entrance that has been closed off to the public.
As I get closer, I see this sign.
Doesn't look like much going on yet, but there is a wall separating the rest of the second floor mall corridor. Thankfully the first floor of the mall was still open on my visit.
Back to the interior of the Sears.
Lots of mattresses and appliances spread out across this section of the store.
Well they almost covered the space that was part of the former electronics department.
The rest of the mattress selection looks impressive for what you normally find at Sears.
I was actually surprised to see a small electronics department still here in the least busy part of the store. In 2019, Sears has all but eliminated their electronics departments.
There was really not much left, but it was still a pleasant surprise.
The appliance selection was very good.
More appliances.
One of the few boxes in the appliance department. A lot of Sears stores have filled empty space by leaving boxed appliances out in the aisles to fill empty space.
Another sparsely filled selection of random furniture pieces.
Luggage and small appliances.
Random small boxed appliances setup to fill empty space.
The main checkout on the second floor did not have any cashiers and had a sign directing you to the first floor checkouts. There were a handful of employees walking the second floor, but I only passed 2 small groups of customers in my 10 minutes up there browsing.
Old school escalators/stairs.
The final view of the second floor as I walk down the escalators.
This huge banner could be seen from the busiest part of the store, the checkout area.
Back to the first floor. Sporting goods and tools.
2 different Sears logos on the Sears crates.
Lawn and garden with Christmas items still standing.
They had good discounts on the remaining Christmas items at this point.
A few spots in the store had ceiling tiles missing or heavily stained.
Despite the issues with the ceiling, the Men's department was one of the nicest and most stocked I have seen in a while.
A view of another open ceiling in the Men's clothing department.
More views of the apparel departments as I head to the mall entrance.
I wish that I had been able to get one of these signs for my collection.
Here is the mall entrance that was still open in January 2019. Next time we will check out the mall, stay tuned for the next post. Lots of photos and a video from this once prosperous and famous mall.
Those "Sears 125 Years" signs definitely are cool. I would've liked to have gotten my hands on one, too.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if you can get the one in the photo now that this store is closing. They may have already taken it down since this promotion technically ended in 2018.
DeleteThanks for the pictures of this store, they are quite interesting. It is rather interesting that these photos were taken after Christmas because I recently visited the Willowbrook Mall Sears for the first time since around Christmas. Rather surprisingly, I noticed that they still had some Christmas stuff (clothing/pajamas mostly) on clearance even here in second half of August! I assume that is leftover stuff from last year and not new stuff for this Christmas since it was on clearance. Perhaps they stored it away and brought it back as clearance items here recently, I don't know.
ReplyDeleteSome of the departments at the Sunrise Mall Sears look quite good, but some look quite sparse. Like you said, the mattress department looks nice where they actually have mattresses. I'm not sure why there is such a big empty space in there, but still, it reminds me a bit of the mattress department at the old Baybrook Mall Sears.
This Sears still has some electronics, but it looks like most of it is on clearance. I suspect there might not be an electronics department by now. Still, it looks like one could have gotten a good deal on a Wi-Fi router/access point! I know I got a good deal on one during a clearance sale at the Mall of the Mainland Sears 3-4 years ago.
I've seen those wooden crates at some other Sears. The Gwinnett Place Mall Sears in Atlanta comes to mind. They're interesting, but they must be from the early 2000s I'm guessing given the logos.
The toy department does look pretty nice and bright. I'm sure it'll attract some attention.
I really noticed the dirty ceiling tiles in the pictures even before you brought up the topic. Aside from that, the broken lighting at the mall entrance, and the broken escalator, the store looks to be in okay physical condition. I suppose it's not much better or worse than other Sears of a similar age. Hopefully this store can continue on for a while. I've heard of a couple of stores which have started closing sales recently which weren't on the most recent list of store closures. Hopefully none of those stores are in this area, but of course, the Mall of the Mainland Sears is under liquidation right now. The signs were just put up a day or two ago.
Sadly as you probably already know, this Sears is now on a countdown to a December 2019 closure. I guess they had already given up on this store, but the sales must have dipped just below where they needed to be. Maybe the property is more valuable now with Sunrise Mall slated for redevelopment.
DeleteAs you mentioned another round of stores has started closing including this one but thankfully the last Texas Kmart is spared. This is the only Texas store on the list, either 14 or 15 will be left after this latest round of closures.
I will reply to parts 1 and 2 of your other comments at a later time.