Macy's closing Eastland and Westland stores

**dtowncitylover** · January-04-17, 05:33 PM

...and Westland? Macy's closure specifics have been announced...

http://www.freep.com/story/money/bus...land/96169700/

**EastsideAl** · January-04-17, 05:38 PM

http://www.clickondetroit.com/consum...-holiday-sales

Eastland has been hanging by a thread for years, so I'm saddened but not surprised to see it go. As an eastsider who's been going there since my childhood I'll miss it. Probably the death knell for the entire center too, which would be a shame.

Surprised about Westland though. Have been there maybe twice in my life however, so maybe I'm missing something.

**casscorridor** · January-04-17, 06:36 PM

Originally Posted by EastsideAl

http://www.clickondetroit.com/consum...-holiday-sales

Eastland has been hanging by a thread for years, so I'm saddened but not surprised to see it go. As an eastsider who's been going there since my childhood I'll miss it. Probably the death knell for the entire center too, which would be a shame.

Surprised about Westland though. Have been there maybe twice in my life however, so maybe I'm missing something.

My question is, long term, what happens to these working-class suburbs such as Westland and Eastpointe?

**iheartthed** · January-04-17, 06:41 PM

Not to be outdone, KMart/Sears announced quite a few of their own closings. Westland is taking it on the chin... http://www.businessinsider.com/list-...closing-2017-1

**Danny** · January-04-17, 06:52 PM

After Macy's leaves, Eastland Mall will Die!

After Macy's leave Westland Mall, Westland Mall still survive. For a couple of decades.

**stasu1213** · January-04-17, 07:28 PM

I blame Eastland mall very poor management and not having a turnaround plan such as Macomb Mall has

**stasu1213** · January-04-17, 07:31 PM

Originally Posted by casscorridor

My question is, long term, what happens to these working-class suburbs such as Westland and Eastpointe?

Westland will survive but Eastpointe will reclaim the East Detroit name as more unwanted Detroiters will reside there due to the soon to be rapid decline in the cost of living

**Danny** · April-15-19, 02:52 PM

Originally Posted by stasu1213

Westland will survive but Eastpointe will reclaim the East Detroit name as more unwanted Detroiters will reside there due to the soon to be rapid decline in the cost of living

Eastland Mall is in the Detroit-Eastpointe and Harper Woods ghetto hood. And I do not see no signs of improvement. It's dying!!!

**401don** · January-04-17, 07:55 PM

I keep waiting for the big shoe to drop - Sears closing North American wide. That will be the death of hundreds of malls. They have already pulled their hardware & electronics sections here in Canada and closed their best Toronto stores in order to raise cash by selling the leases.

**Scottathew** · January-05-17, 09:16 AM

Originally Posted by 401don

I keep waiting for the big shoe to drop - Sears closing North American wide.

I'm frankly shocked that K-Mart is still a thing anywhere. I think Sears can survive in the biggest\highest traffic of malls.

I worked for K-Mart back in the day when Walmart hadn't penetrated every corner of the Earth. K-Mart simply sucked and never updated for modern times.

**1953** · January-05-17, 09:48 AM

As an Eastsider myself, this really seems like it should be a focusing event for east side communities to get together and plan action steps to improve the health of the area.

What is the future of east side communities? They are aging, they have decaying infrastructure, the homes are small and not in keeping with trends in U.S. real estate. There is no walk-ability. Something must be done.

I might just go see my local planning officials.

1953

**313WX** · January-06-17, 05:21 PM

Originally Posted by 1953

As an Eastsider myself, this really seems like it should be a focusing event for east side communities to get together and plan action steps to improve the health of the area.

What is the future of east side communities? They are aging, they have decaying infrastructure, the homes are small and not in keeping with trends in U.S. real estate. There is no walk-ability. Something must be done.

I might just go see my local planning officials.

1953

Not sure honestly.

The east side was always the working class side of town with all of the good-paying manufacturing jobs.

Unfortunately, between the move towards automation / globalizaton and the Big 3 automakers now having less than 50% of the market share [[versus 75-90% during the 50s - 90s), those jobs aren't coming back. And even if they did, they wouldn't pay nearly as well as they did in the past).

**EastsideAl** · January-06-17, 05:54 PM

Originally Posted by 1953

As an Eastsider myself, this really seems like it should be a focusing event for east side communities to get together and plan action steps to improve the health of the area.

What is the future of east side communities? They are aging, they have decaying infrastructure, the homes are small and not in keeping with trends in U.S. real estate. There is no walk-ability. Something must be done.

I might just go see my local planning officials.

1953

Really astonishing how little shopping is left in the eastern part of the metro area. Even though, outside of the long decline of the city itself, the population really hasn't declined. On this occasion of the closure of the Eastland Macy's my dad and I were just talking nostalgically about the shopping options gone and going over the few reasonably reachable shopping options still available to an east side senior like him. What a depressing conversation that turned into...

**Scottathew** · January-05-17, 11:47 AM

Originally Posted by 401don

[[Sears) have already pulled their hardware & electronics sections here in Canada and closed their best Toronto stores in order to raise cash by selling the leases.

I also see in the news that Sears is selling the Craftsman brand for $900 Million. That's pretty crazy they are THAT desperate for cash that they're selling off their vital organs to survive.

**Danny** · January-04-17, 06:59 PM

Blame online shopping!

**Bigdd** · January-04-17, 11:16 PM

Originally Posted by Danny

Blame online shopping!

Perhaps,.. but the data shows [[to my surprise) that 93% of purchases are still made at brick & mortar stores.

Kmart stopped selling anything people wanted more than a decade ago.

Sears was built on customer service. But in the last 20 years you go into the tool section for instance,.. and instead of 5 sales-people who were all knowledgeable,.. you find one gal behind the register who can't tell you where the cut-off wheels are,.. because she has no idea what one is.

It's a tough business for sure. I still buy ratchets and sockets at Sears,... and have bought leaf-blowers and such there. Even a counter-top last month. But I expect them to disappear soon.

Shocked to hear that there are still Kmarts. I thought they went bankrupt years ago. I haven't seen a Kmart in 2-3 years.

**clubboss** · January-05-17, 04:44 AM

Originally Posted by Bigdd

Perhaps,.. but the data shows [[to my surprise) that 93% of purchases are still made at brick & mortar stores.

Completely inaccurate

**Zacha341** · January-05-17, 07:30 AM

I would tend to agree. Walk-in purchases are way down. Even considering many now purchased online occurred this holiday season from Macy's etc [[I made several from Macy's this way recently), which does little for the standing stores.

Then factor in online sales from Amazon, eBay, Itsy and other web-based specialty stores and their discount wars therein. Yeah, in store purchases are down by a significant percent. Enough to bring about these closings, along with other reasons.

Originally Posted by clubboss

Completely inaccurate

Originally Posted by Bigdd

Perhaps,.. but the data shows [[to my surprise) that 93% of purchases are still made at brick & mortar stores...

**pocketchange** · January-05-17, 07:57 AM

Looks like 93% isn't too far off

https://ycharts.com/indicators/ecomm...t_retail_sales

but that considers everything...

While 7 percent might sound like just a sliver of the market, remember that there are still a lot of things you wouldn't think of buying online, such as gasoline, cars and restaurant meals. Within certain categories, such as apparel, the shift to the Internet has been faster, according to Poonam Goyal, an analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence."Companies that generate the largest portion of their sales from online are apparel stores," Goyal said. "Their online sales are often more than 15 percent of their total sales, so the potential there is enormous.”

**Gistok** · January-05-17, 03:48 AM

Eastland is in Harper Woods [[Wayne County) and not Eastpointe [[Macomb County), so no name change back to East Detroit. Eastland is where Harper Woods, Detroit and Eastpointe borders meet. Agree poor management.

**Hermod** · January-05-17, 05:47 AM

Included in the Macy's closings is downtown Minneapolis which was the flagship of the old Dayton stores [[later Dayton-Hudson and now evolved into Target). Somehow, it hung on while downtown Hudson's went down years ago. Target sold their Dayton-Hudson chain to Macy's.

**mikefmich** · January-05-17, 07:12 AM

Played at Eastland when it was still woods & swamp. My first regular job was there too.
I was very relieved when they built it, 'cause it kept me from going shopping with my ma all the way downtown or Northland, which were both day long affairs. Eastland was only 10 minutes away.

Oh well......time marches on.

**Zacha341** · January-05-17, 08:03 AM

^^^ Good point! I'd sure like some just peeking fresh from the kitchen Eggs Benedict to appear at my door via online right about now...

...

Not doing. Some items cannot be purchased online!

**Cincinnati_Kid** · January-05-17, 08:13 AM

Macy's closing 68 stores nationwide, must be losing money.

**Bham1982** · January-05-17, 08:18 AM

Eastland is toast. I bet within five years they'll demolish the enclosed mall portion and replace with strip-mall retail. Westland will probably survive a bit longer, but is probably doomed too, at least in mall format.

Malls are doing reasonably well, but only upscale-leaning malls. Discount shoppers go to Target, Meijer or Walmart and malls anchored by Sears and JCPenney just don't work anymore.

Somerset, Twelve Oaks, Village at Rochester Hills and Partridge Creek are all very successful malls. The rest are generally struggling.

KMart will be gone within 5 years, and Sears within 10. Macys is still healthy and profitable and will be fine long-term, but needs to shed more properties in declining malls. They still have too many leases in so-so malls [[Southland, Fairlane, Oakland, Lakeside, etc.). At least they got rid of the total junk locations [[Summit Place, Northland, Eastland, Westland).