INDIAN RIVER COUNTY— While some shoppers mourned the announcement that Sears is closing its Indian River Mall location, others see it as a chance to revitalize the mall.
The 23-year-old Sears store is expected to close late October. Liquidation is expected to begin Aug.15.It is the last Sears store on the Treasure Coast following closure of the Sears at Treasure Coast Square earlier this year.
Some retailers, however, have been waiting for this kind of break — the closing of an outdated retail store such as Sears and the chance to bring in a more current tenant, said Nate Cutchin, senior director of retail services in Orlando forColliers International, the real estate firm hired about six months ago to find tenants to fill the mall's empty stores.
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Retail is a changing business, said Katy Welsh, senior director of retail in South Florida with Colliers International. Stores such as Sears are going the way of Woolworth's, she said.
Malls, too, are evolving into entertainment centers and town centers — places people can shop, have fun, work andmaybe even live, she said.
It's very exciting. It's an opportunity to really create something for the community, Welsh said. This place will be back-filled with something more current.
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Replacing Sears with another apparel store is unlikely, Welsh said. Instead, she sees a home goods store, a discounter such as TJ Maxx or a family entertainment center, which is becoming a more common sightat malls.
Trampoline parks or large fitness centers are part of a new trend of retailtainment filling mall spaces, especially spots vacated by anchor stores, she said.
A lot of people are waiting for these dated retailers to go out, Cutchin said. It's the first step in bringing the mall back to life.
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Still, the news of Sears' impending closure surprised shoppers such as Grace Sanchez and her husband, Jorge Suarez, of Vero Beach, who enjoyed the large store.
Any time you see a big store like this closing, you think, 'What are people going to think?', said Sanchez. People are going to think, 'What's happening to the mall? Who's next?'
The mall, which opened in 1996, has struggled throughout its history. Its Gap, Disney Store and RJ Gator's closed in 2008. In 2014, Simon Property Group defaulted on its $71.3 million mortgage for the mall and the adjacent Indian River Commons Plaza.
S Us Highway 1, Fort Pierce, Fl 34952
The mall's four anchor stores — Dilliard's, JCPenney, Macy's and Sears — owned their own buildings and parts of the parking lot. In February, Sear's Roebuck sold its building to Transform Dove Holdings of Bay Harbor Springs, for $9.4 million, according to the Indian River County Property Appraiser. The sale included the 120, 384-square-foot store and 250, 000-square-foot parking lot, property appraiser records show.
Want more Treasure Coast news? If you're already a subscriber to , thank you! If not, please subscribe and help keep the news you want coming.NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Sears is shutting down 150 more stores, yet another sign of how tough it is for former kings of the retail industry to compete in a world now dominated by Amazon.
Sears said on Thursday that it would close 109 Kmart stores, including the Kmart on South Federal Highway in Fort Pierce, and 41 of its namesake Sears outlets. The announcement came on the same day that Sears disclosed plans to sell its iconic Craftsman tool brand to Stanley Black & Decker.
Sears Closing At Indian River Mall Seen A
But a spokesperson said that most of them were part-time workers and that we are committed to treating these associates with respect and compassion during this process.
The news also follows disappointing holiday results from other retail stores: Macy's -- which is also closing stores and laying off workers -- and Kohl's.
Sears CEO Eddie Lampert said in a statement that the company was taking strong, decisive actions...to stabilize the company and improve our financial flexibility in what remains a challenging retail environment.
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The company noted that while the 150 stores collectively reported sales of $1.2 billion over the past 12 months, they also lost about $60 million. Sears has to stop the bleeding somehow, because the entire company is losing money.
The decision to close stores is a difficult but necessary step as we take actions to strengthen the company's operations and fund its transformation, Lampert said.
Many of these stores have struggled with their financial performance for years and we have kept them open to maintain local jobs and in the hopes that they would turn around, he added.
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Lampert stressed that the only way for the whole company to return to profitability will be for Sears to focus more on its better performing stores. (Click here for a list of the Kmart and Sears stores that are getting shut down.)
The company said that workers at the closing stores will receive severance payments and also have the opportunity to apply for positions at other Sears and Kmart stores in their area. And liquidation sales at the affected stores will begin on Friday.FORT PIERCE — The 40-year-old Kmart store had survived previous rounds of store closings, but the onetime retail giant’s owner, Sears Holdings, has confirmed the store will close this spring.
The lease for the 88, 732-square-foot store in the Gateway Plaza at U.S. 1 and Virginia Avenue, which opened in 1976, expired at the end of 2016 and was not renewed.
Mcneil Rd, Fort Pierce, Fl 34981
Store employees were informed a week ago, but Sears Holdings did not confirm the closing of the Fort Pierce Kmart until Wednesday, when it also announced 78 more Kmarts and 26 Sears stores would close. In Florida, eight other Kmarts and one Sears also are on the chopping block, but no others on the Treasure Coast.
“Many of these stores have struggled with their financial performance for years and we have kept them open to maintain local jobs and in the hopes that they would turn around, ” the Sears Holdings news release said. “But in order to meet our objective of returning to profitability, we have to make tough decisions and will continue to do so, which will give our better-performing stores a chance at success.”
Two commercial real estate brokers with extensive Treasure Coast experience speculated on a future similar to the site of the former Kmart in Stuart.
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On Dec. 30, 2011, Sears Holdings listed the Kmart store in the 35-year-old Martin Square mall, at 3020 S.E. U.S. 1 in Stuart, among 80 Sears and Kmart stores it would close. The 331, 000-square-foot Martin Square is anchored by Home Depot and Staples.
Boyd Bradfield, broker-president of NAI Southcoast Commercial Real Estate Services in Stuart, said he expects that eventually the Gateway Plaza space will be filled the way the former Kmart store in Stuart was repurposed. “It probably will be back-filled with retail, but will probably have to be split up. There are not very many of those big-box retailers that are doing expansion right now.”
In 2015, home décor chain Old Time Pottery opened a 64, 000-square-foot store, leasing more than half of the 109, 000-square-foot space Kmart had occupied. The rest of that space remains vacant.
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“When a center loses a large box, whether it’s an anchor or a junior anchor, in a good market or bad, it takes significant time to replace it. ... Sometimes you see it get re-tenented with non-traditional retail use, ” said Alex Aydelotte, co-owner of Florida Commercial Enterprises in Stuart, citing Liberty Medical and Virginia College as examples.
“The location might limit new tenant activity to a certain level, but we are in a much improved real estate market, so leasing as a whole is much better than it has been in recent years, ” Aydelotte said.
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