Here is another one from my archives. Not a whole lot changed from my visits to this mall in 2018 and 2019, but there are a lot more photos to share of this awesome property. Since we stayed next door to the mall, we made several visits on this particular trip. The photos will jump around a bit. We will start with some Sears logo photos.
Now for some Liverpool sign photos.
Now for the inside of the mall with a quick trip through Sears.
Now for my favorite part of the store. I wonder how many of these items are still available in 2023 as physical media continues to disappear in the United States.
Liverpool which is similar to Dillard's.
This caught my eye while walking through the store. A Foley's clothing brand with a very similar logo to the old Foley's logo here in the United States. There was also a small department sign but my photo did not come out clear.
Motorcycle department, always cool to see in a department store.
Random furniture display.
Sporting goods department with the lonely American Football on the top right corner.
Now we will see the main mall concourse. This is the center court facing Cinepolis.
Casino
Food court
Center court mall store advertisement.
Center court facing Liverpool.
Cinepolis first floor entrance.
The court in front of Cinepolis.
Cinepolis second floor entrance.
A closed off storefront near Cinepolis.
Digital advertisement in the center court.
After the retail closing hour, the mall gets spooky.
Liverpool has a small pharmacy and medical service store front.
Sanborns mall entrance stays open a bit later than the rest of the mall.
The side mall entrance to Sanborns.
The mall directory.
Large toy store similar to Toys R Us.
Back to the inside of Liverpool.
I really miss the days when department stores in the United States carried a full range of electronics. Best Buy closed off their Mexico stores a couple of years ago, so I wonder if the sales at these department stores have picked up since then.
Now for the furniture department.
Candy counter
Lucy's classic style food outlet that sells snacks, malts, shakes, and drinks. A pretty cool throwback to the old school American diner.
More of the mall.
And another trip to Sears.
More of the electronics department.
Sears also has a motorcycle department.
More views throughout the store.
Now we will jump to the electronics department at Sanborns which is also owned by Sears Mexico.
Sanborns has an old school style restaurant. Even though the mall is fairly new, Sanborns still builds their stores in a retro style.
Now we jump back to Liverpool.
Liverpool may have been getting rid of their music and movie selection at this time. The remaining selection had been squeezed into the book department.
Most of what remained of the music and movie selection was located on these small displays.
More of the sporting goods department in Liverpool.
And to finish off this post, here is the mall directory.
More to come, stay tuned to the blog.
These are some amazing scenes from inside a Mexican mall. Even though I've come to expect these nice scenes from Mexican department stores, it is still a little bit shocking to see them and, of course, a bit depressing that we don't have anything even remotely similar here in the US anymore. Hopefully Mexican department stores are still in similar shape today as they were pre-pandemic.
ReplyDeleteThat Foley's piece at Sears is the most amazing thing here, obviously. I know that there is a store called Foley's in Mexico, and I'm sure it is a knockoff of our Foley's, but I didn't realize Foley's products were sold in other stores as well. I don't know what's more amazing, seeing the Foley's name in use here in modern times or a Sears which is this nice!
It really is quite amazing to see so much physical media in stores even in 2019. I'm sure there might be some infrastructure limitations in Mexico which makes streaming less than ideal in Mexico and, even otherwise, some cultures seem to value physical media more than others even if they have great infrastructure. Germany and Japan come to mind. Maybe Mexico is like that as well. I know Mexico has many famous artists and so maybe the people there are very supportive of their artists by buying their albums. Granted, many of the albums in the photos are of US music so there must be a big audience for that.
The sporting goods departments, especially with the motorcycles, are unlike anything I've seen in the US even in the glory days of department stores. Well, I know Sears US experimented with selling Allstate brand cars at one time, but that was certainly before my time. I would have expected to see more pigskin footballs given the growing popularity of the sport, but at least that one football doesn't have the Cowboys logo on it which seems common in Mexico, lol. It is also interesting to see NBA and NCAA model basketballs. I suppose there is an audience for US basketball in Mexico as well.
Lucy's is certainly interesting and it looks nicer than many of the remaining diner-era places here in Houston at least in modern times. It is like a slice of 59 Diner. Granted, I don't know if 59 Diner had any ads on the wall for Patti, "the co-ed with the educated torso," lol.
On the topic of books and physical media, there is some Houston news to report. Barnes & Noble is replacing their W. Holcombe location they were evicted from last year near the Vanderbilt Square Randall's with a new downsized location in the Weslayan Plaza Randall's shopping center. I guess B&N likes to be near Randall's, they've often located their stores near Randall's stores here in Houston over the years. Supposedly there are plans for a new Conroe store as well. B&N's expansion in Houston is certainly a bit unexpected. They recently opened a new downsized store in Richardson which will probably look like the new Houston ones. It looks pretty nice compared to most modern retailers at least.
With Sears most unexpected return out on the west coast, maybe there is hope for Sears to return to Willowbrook Mall for take 3. I'm not hoping for much, even if they do open again in Houston, it probably won't last much longer than Sears Hometown did in 2022. At least the west coast stores have more inventory than the Willowbrook Sears Hometown had.
I am pretty sure that this was my last Mexico post left in my archives. I really do wonder how things changed there since my last visit. So many things have changed here since the pandemic in 2020. I wonder how this mall is holding up as well.
ReplyDeleteInternet connectivity throughout Mexico is pretty good from what I hear and on my visits to the country, wi-fi was pretty easy to find. I would guess that physical media is also on the decline, but not as sharply as here in the US. Electronics are a lot more pricey, but I didn't pay attention to any cell phone plan costs to see how those compare to here in the US.
Macy's seems to be the closest to an old-school department store experience with their addition of the Toys R Us stores. I wonder if Best Buy shrinks their store count, will Macy's add them to their department store floor plans as well. Appliances, TV's, and electronic gadgets would be a nice addition to those stores. The attempt JCPenney made at bringing back appliances wasn't a very good one though.
Barnes and Noble shrinking their store size is not a surprise. Deerbrook Mall has a smaller 1995 era store, and it seems like they spaced out their product selections to fit in the store. It is a similar trick to what we saw at Sears and Fry's as those chains were really in the decline. Speaking about Deerbrook, the mall recently lost the Casa Ole restaurant that had been there probably since the mall opened. The original location was where Barnes and Noble is now, and they moved upstairs to make room for that store in 1995.
The Sears that reopened in California has a pretty good selection and even a Christmas department. I believe the last year Sears set up a Christmas department in our area was in 2019. I guess 2020 wouldn't be a good year to compare since our last full-sized Sears was in the midst of the store closing sale. I think we have seen the last of Sears in this area, but you never know.
Speaking of Macy's, did you see the news a few weeks ago that some private equity group focused on real estate made an offer to buy Macy's? I'm not sure what came of that as I have not followed the story, but at least when the news broke, there was some fear that if Macy's agreed to the buy out, Macy's would eventually suffer a similar fate as Sears has since the buyer would only want Macy's for their real estate and not for their retail operations. I'm not really a fan of the modern version of Macy's. The old Macy's and Foley's were much better, but adding electronics back to their stores would help bring me back in.
DeleteSpeaking of Macy's, did you see that Kohan has sold Almeda Mall to some company named 4th Dimension Properties out of Florida? 4th Dimension also owns Central Mall in Port Arthur and Central Mall in Texarkana. I don't know anything about them. Hopefully they aren't another Kohan, but at least Almeda is out of Kohan's grasp now.
Humble was a real oddity in modern times with it having that Casa Ole in Deerbrook Mall, the Pancho's, and also the Monterey's Little Mexico. It seemed inevitable that one or two of those three would close as the demand for 1980s (and prior) style cheap Mexican restaurants has really waned with there being so many better chains and local places. Monterey's Little Mexico is probably the strongest of the three and I'm not sure how much longer Pancho's will be around. That is the last Pancho's in the Houston area and it is surprising it has lasted this long.
I read a little bit about the offer on Macy's. From what I gather, it is a similar offer to the attempt to buy Kohls last year. With malls being on the decline, I am not sure what kind of value their real estate will have as a whole. Maybe the value of the good properties makes up for the value of the bad properties they own.
DeleteAlmeda getting sold by Kohan is probably the best-case scenario for the mall. Both Central Malls have taken a hit from the loss of Sears, Bealls, and in Port Arthur the loss of Bed Bath and Beyond as well. Central Mall in Port Arthur may see a bit of resurgence as several refineries and chemical plants in the area have been continually expanding. Downtown Port Arthur is also coming back to life with two long-vacant buildings being redeveloped into offices for Motiva. In addition to that redevelopment project, a brand new large residential complex is nearly complete in downtown as well. Just about every building that can't be saved has been demolished as well.
You are right about those old Mexican restaurant chains still having a presence in Humble. Monterey's had a recent facelift, so the building looks really nice now. Pancho's is pretty sad; we went there last Spring on a Sunday afternoon. Even the sopapillas tasted off, like they were fried in old oil.
It's pretty awesome to see such elaborate and nice looking architecture and varied merchandise selection at these Mexican department stores. The mall itself looks good architecturally and in good shape business-wise, too. Definitely a stark contrast to what we have in the majority of US malls and department stores these days.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely, this mall is a great example of what could be done to malls as a mixed-use property. With only two retail anchors and a variety of things to eat and do beside shop, this mall is a true community center. There is a gym, casino, 2 arcades in addition to the restaurants, pharmacy, and shopping options.
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