Here is another quick update post to see how the West Hill Mall was doing after the loss of their last 2 anchor stores. Nearly a year after losing both Palais Royal and JCPenney, the store lineup is exactly the same. Kudos to these store owners keeping the mall alive in the face of tough competition and the loss of the mall anchor stores.
Check out my previous post from yesterday here if you missed it. I apologize for the lack of content. I am committed to completing the posts that I have documented.
Since I have extensively covered this mall in the past, I will skip the commentary on this post as well. There is really nothing new besides the closings of the anchor stores. Here is the link to my previous post.
It certainly would have been nice to see West Hill Mall doing better, but given the loss of anchors, I suppose it is fortunate that the mall is even still around. While not everything at Lee Baron looks bad, some of those suits "for the modern man" certainly would not be my first choice, lol. Oh well, I guess it is good to have options.
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting to see the independent eyeglasses store hanging around at a mall. It seems that eyeglass stores have started to become less common at malls around Houston. I had to take a family member to Willowbrook Mall recently to buy new glasses and the options are far less than what used to be the case a few years ago. The family member used to get her glasses at the Sears Optical, but obviously that is no longer the case. TSO and the independent shop at the mall have closed along with Visionworks (there is still a Visionworks across FM 1960 at The Commons). LensCrafters is still around, but they apparently stopped doing 1 hour glasses several years ago. Who knew?
The family member ended up buying her glasses from JCPenney's optical center. They were about $100 cheaper than LensCrafters without LensCrafers offering anything more or being any faster. I wouldn't be surprised if JCPenney's optical center and LensCrafters are owned by the same company, it seems one or two companies run most of the optical stores including the old Sears Opticals. Anyway, said family member was happy with the end result. I'm glad at least one department store still sells glasses and seems to be a decent value.
Speaking of malls which are just barely hanging on, did you see the recent Houston Chronicle article about Macroplaza Mall? It was interesting to see the interview with one of the remaining tenants. It sounded like the tenant admitted there was no logical reason to stay at the mall.
I'm sure you saw the news about Macy's and their plans to close stores. Sadly, that may lead to similar results like what we see here. I'm not sure if any Houston locations are especially endangered, but Almeda Mall might be on that list. The store still seems to draw a crowd, but Mike from HHR was there recently and the store has some maintenance issues with the flooring especially. That is strange since it is new flooring that was put in after Hurricane Ike so it is not like it is a 1960s relic or something.
I don't know how this mall continues to survive with all of the newer shopping centers in the area. Downtown Huntsville is also an antique and local retail hotspot. The mall doesn't really have much to offer at this point. The few businesses that remain must have loyal customers. The empty JCPenney with the logos still intact is the first thing most people see when pulling up to the mall.
DeleteJCPenney seems to have the same vibe as Sears did towards the end. I have been to Deerbrook a couple of times recently and JCPenney seems like a dead spot now. Deerbrook has filled a lot of vacancies between the Macy's and the Dillard's/JCPenney anchors, but the Sears corridor on the second floor is dying out. The old Palais Royal and a couple of small stores are the only other vacancies outside of the Sears wing now. Eyeglass shops were a great fit for malls because you could place an order and wait for an hour like you mentioned.
Sadly, the Hats and More has left the mall per a recent comment on my Youtube video at the mall. I just posted a 2019-2021 update at the mall, but I am saving my 2023 and future 2024 visits for a later post. I just happened to notice a remnant of the old mall right up against the old Sears building. I saw the Macroplaza article as well. The site was sold back in 2022, but nothing new has happened since then.
Almeda was the Macy's store that I thought about initially as well. I think we will see a few surprises in the store closing list. The Men's store at Willowbrook seems like another candidate for closing. The floors were in bad shape when I went to Almeda in late 2022, sounds like things haven't gotten better. It is crazy that it has already been about 15 years since that store reopened after Hurricane Ike. I wonder if the issue is with the foundation or did the contractors do a terrible job of installing the new floor.