Maybe not the best photo to start with, but here it is. This is the Hulen Mall Sears location which closed on August 9th, 2020. This location is one of the few Sears stores located in a former Montgomery Ward location. This store opened in 2002 a year after the Montgomery Ward closed. We visited on August 2, 2020 a week before the store closed.
From this view of the store, you can really see the Montgomery Ward look is still intact.
Even the standalone Auto Center has the old Montgomery Ward look.
Some messages written on the customer door are a nice touch.
The auto center road sign looks older than it actually is.
One last look at the auto center before we go to the main store.
Now we will enter the store.
Even with the store going out of business, this table was set up to advertise Sears/Citi credit cards.
Early on in the visit, we noticed large areas of the store barricaded. Thankfully only the first floor had large sections barricaded in the former clothing departments. Even with the barricades, you could still walk around almost the entire store.
With this store being remodeled and opened in 2002, it was one of the newer Sears stores and still looked very nice.
Some of the walls in the clothing departments like this one are different than I have seen before.
And this wall as well.
Just a few racks left here, mostly everything else had been moved to the center of the first floor.
It appears that the store had been updated with the Lands End Ladies department. Not a lot of Sears stores in Texas had gotten the update.
The mall entrance.
After a quick walk up, we are now on the second floor.
I am pretty sure this was the former electronics department. It would have been nice to see how it looked from the mall entrance back in the day. Or better yet, if this was once the Montgomery Ward Electric Avenue.
The tool department.
I can't recall any other Sears store with this mustard colored border. The whole tool/lawn and garden/sporting goods department had this border.
Pretty much the last bit of tools available. The mustard border looks out of place here. That color is such a strange choice, usually we see red, black, or white with the tools.
One of the few failed promotions that came out after the bankruptcy.
Sporting goods and a little bit of lawn and garden were mixed in.
Just not a lot to see at this point. Most of the remaining items were on the first floor.
The retro escalator area, probably untouched from the Montgomery Ward days.
Appliance area
One of the best things to see at these store closing sales are the old portrait studios. You just never know what you will see since most of these spaces were used for storage.
Say cheese 😬
Not sure what was back here, but usually the Hearing Aid, Optical, or Tax services were in spaces like these.
Looking towards the center of the store from the side entrance.
Inside the door on the left is one of the most intriguing finds of all of my Sears visits. The wall extends in an odd way as well here.
I have so many questions for what I saw here. I probably could have walked in further, but I didn't want to have risk having a weird encounter with an employee.
Was this a leftover from the Montgomery Ward days?
Was this a restaurant space? It really looks like a former restaurant area.
If it was a restaurant, what was it?
More views of the appliance and former electronics areas of the store.
Of course, the escalator was broken so we had to use the mall stairs.
Let's go downstairs again to finish up the tour.
The rest of the first floor had the majority of the products left in the store along with the fixture graveyard. The fixture selection here was very thin at this point in the sale.
The escalator going up was working.
Fixtures, fixtures, fixtures.
A view of some of the remaining clothes just past the fixtures.
A lonely checkout.
More of the remaining goods.
Of course, what Sears closing sale is complete without the rug sale.
No more shopping carts remained at this point in the sale unless they were in storage.
A peek into some of the barricaded areas of the store.
Another look at the rugs.
And back into the center of the store. The shoes were surprisingly plentiful, usually the stock is pretty low by this point in a store closing sale.
Another look at the Lands End department.
Last 7 days!
More fixtures. We did not leave empty handed at this store, we got a computer kiosk sign that would have more than likely been trashed. I really appreciate the employees who will sell items with the Sears logo.
Jewelry counters
There is usually jewelry left all the way up until the end of the store closing sales.
One of the finds while picking around the store.
Farewell Hulen Mall Sears, we barely knew ya.
More to come, stay tuned!
Wow, these photos are even more interesting than I thought they would be and I was expecting them to be interesting! Thanks for the photos. The highlight here has to be that part of the Montgomery Ward restaurant that is visible. Montgomery Ward stores did have restaurants when this store would have opened. In fact, even the Willowbrook Mall Wards had a restaurant apparently, but I don't remember it. Anyway, I'm sure what you photographed is part of the old restaurant. Those Wards restaurants seem to be a forgotten, little-documented part of history so what you found is a real gem.
ReplyDeleteParts of this Sears looks like it could have been 40+ years old even though it was only a Sears for about 20 years. That Auto Center signage looks older than it is as you say. Some of the signage on the auto center itself appears to be original to the Wards like the 'enter' sign.
If I had to guess, the mustard color in the tool department might be related to the Sears Tool Territory marketing campaign Sears was using at one time around the time this store opened.
I have not seen that tent sale sign before. I know Sears/Kmart stores were trying to do tent sales/sidewalk sales around the time of the bankruptcy, but I never saw a sign like that before with a flag that looks like the Kmart logo. That's really neat. I'm surprised you didn't ask to have that sign!
Montgomery Ward and Sears were both interesting stores and so it's always interesting to see a building that once housed both. I'm sure that restaurant photo will cause a lot of further discussion with fellow retail enthusiasts!
I didn't even know about the history of this store prior to visiting here. The good thing about the store is that there are entrances on both floors to make redevelopment a little more inviting. The restaurant spot seemed out of place for a Sears store. The Sears tool territory could have been the reason for the tool department area paint job. The El Paso Sears had a faded sign, but I don't remember much else about that promotion.
DeleteThe tent sales were yet another failed effort to bring customers in and keep them coming. At the time of this promotion, inventory had really began to thin out at stores. I went to a couple of stores during the promotion, it was just too little too late.
I'm surprised the second floor was still accessible. Very cool find with the former restaurant-looking space up there, though! Cool that you were able to purchase that kiosk sign, too.
ReplyDeleteI am glad it was still open as well. The Parks Sears location had both floors open as well, but it was not as interesting as this Sears was. The liquidator actually didn't charge us for the sign, my son expressed interest in thee sign so that helped. I would have been alright paying $5, but it would have gone in the trash otherwise. I have only encountered a handful of liquidators that wouldn't let me purchase Sears branded items. You can always try to go another day and find someone else if you don't succeed.
DeleteI visited this store a few years ago. It did seem a bit nicer than the usual Sears stores. There was a good sized electronics department near the second level entrance.
ReplyDeleteI really wish I had seen the store back then. The mall entrance electronics departments were usually really cool to see.
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