JCPenney mall locations

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Super S
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JCPenney mall locations

Post by Super S »

I have noticed that most of the time, JCPenney locates their stores toward the end of enclosed malls. However, one store stands out, the Karcher Mall store in Nampa, Idaho (which closed when JCPenney relocated to the new Boise Towne Square mall) From what I understand, this store was actually a later addition to the mall.

My question: Is there any particular reason JCPenney preferred the end as opposed to being located toward the center of the mall? And, are there any JCPenney locations located toward the center that were built along with the mall, instead of a later addition?
TW-Upstate NY
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by TW-Upstate NY »

Viewmont Mall along US Route 6 in Dickson City, Pa. (most people would refer to it as Scranton instead) is an example of a center located space. It was built in the mid to late '60's as one of the original anchors (along with Sears on one end and Grants on the other) as a two-story store. To my knowledge, it's still there and hasn't moved within the mall to this day.
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by carolinatraveler »

When Coliseum Mall opened in Hampton, VA in 1973, J.C. Penney was the center anchor - E.J. Korvette on one end, Nachman's (Newport News, VA based) on the other. Korvettes went to empty to Montgomery Ward to Burlington Coat Factory; Nachmans merged with Norfolk based Rice's then sold out to Hess, and Thalheimers, later Hechts was added on to a side hall from Penneys several years after the mall first opened, putting Penneys even more in the "middle" in the mall. Penneys remained there in the middle until moving to an outparcel before the mall was demolished several years ago.

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Andrew T.
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by Andrew T. »

The Memorial Mall in Sheboygan had a central-anchor Penneys (1969), along with both Morgantown, WV mall locations (1974 and 1990) and I'm sure many others as well. I never really thought of there being any pattern to their placement in mall layouts, nor any particular tendency towards being at the end of the barbell.
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Super S
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by Super S »

Perhaps it's a regional thing then. However, of all the places I have lived, including Ohio, Idaho, Wyoming, and currently Washington, the only mall I remember JCPenney NOT being on the end was Karcher Mall.
umtrr-author
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by umtrr-author »

This is subject to faulty memory, but I believe that the smallish JCPenney store in Menlo Park Mall in New Jersey (described as "dry goods only" on the Wikipedia page) was "off to the side" of the main alignment of the mall. I think that the anchors at each end were Montgomery Ward and Bambergers.
rich
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by rich »

@SuperS: Even in Ohio (one of your states), I can think of counter examples. JCPenney at Great Lakes Mall is in the middle of the mall, not at the end. JCP was one of the original tenants. Ditto Columbus' Eastland, Cleveland's Great Northern, and Akron's Chapel Hill. And those just represent one's I know or could easily find on the web.

They were an offset anchor at Salem Mall outside of Dayton, where they were not an original tenant. They were a midline anchor at Columbus' now-departed Northland.
jamcool
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by jamcool »

JCP was the center anchor of Chris Town mall in Phoenix...accessed by the glass-fronted central mall entrance
J-Man
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by J-Man »

At Sunrise Mall in Citrus Heights, CA, the original four anchors were Weinstock's (now Macy's), Liberty House (now Macy's), Penney's, and Sears. Penney's has always occupied one of the two anchor pads that is not on the end of the mall (Weinstocks's/Macy's and Sears have the end locations.)
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by bobsjers »

From what I remember from my childhood (I am 60 now), JCP was about the last department store to go into the malls. So they probably took what they could get. About 15 years ago, they added on to the Deptford NJ Mall in the center behind the food court.

I remember the stores in old downtown areas. I think they had balconies, and I remember the huge 8 light 8' fluorescent fixtures, which were 8' x 8'.

I remember the store in Springfield Virginia Mall. It had everything you could want, like a Sears--tools, gardening, toys, etc. Now all I see at JCP are mostly clothes and linens.
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by MikeRa »

Over at Oxford Valley Mall, in Langhorne/Levittown, PA, when it first opened in 1973, had the following anchors: John Wanamaker (the far left end); JCPenney (left center, on Business US Route 1 side); Gimbels (right center, facing area near US Route 1 superhighway), and Bamberger's (the far right end).

The JCPenney is the only anchor there that has not have a name change (Bamberger's to Macy's; Gimbels to Stern's; John Wanamaker to Hecht's to strawbridge's), or closed (Stern's, replaced by Sears; strawbridge's, replaced by Boscov's, which sinced closed)
rich
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by rich »

JC Penney went into malls very early-on. The store at Great Lakes Mall in Mentor opened in 1961. Five years later they opened 10-15 miles away at Richmond Mall. They were in early malls in Atlanta. They had gone into large metro areas via the first generation of suburban "plazas" and replaced many of these earlier dry goods stores with full-line department stores from the 60s onward. My guess is that they had relationships with developers like DeBartolo and this may explain why there was odd gaps in their national coverage. They were fully represented in Columbus and Cleveland, but not Cincinnati. In the DC area, they had better representation in the Virginia than in the Maryland suburbs in the early mall era.
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by TenPoundHammer »

JCPenney's mall stores in Michigan:

* Courtland Center, Flint: Started out as central anchor, converted from Federal's/Robert Hall Village. This one moved to the west anchor (originally The Fair, later Mervyns) in 2008. Before the move, JCPenney had TWO other storefronts in the mall: a home store in a former Walgreens-turned-Perry Drugs, and an intimates store in a former Marianne clothing shop.

* Lansing Mall, Lansing: Center anchor, converted from Wurzburg's/Knapp's. JCP also took Knapp's stores at Meridian Mall in Lansing Mall and Westwood Mall in Jackson, but they were the western anchor of both malls.

* Westwood Mall, Marquette; Oakland Mall, Troy; Bay City Mall, Bay City; Genesee Valley Center, Flint. Ended up as central anchor because it was a later addition. Oakland briefly had a very small JCPenney in center court that was converted from a grocery store, but it was torn down for the 2-story wing housing the current JCPenney.

* Summit Place Mall, Waterford; Hampton Square Mall, Bay City; Frenchtown Square, Monroe. Also central anchors that were later additions to the mall, but all of these are now closed. Hampton Square store was built 1990 and moved to Bay City Mall only 2 years later!

* Eastland and Northland Centers, Detroit: Unusually mounted stores with 2 entrances. Eastland is now a Sears, and Northland is vacant.

* Grand Traverse Mall, Traverse City; Birchwood Mall, Port Huron: Nearly identically-built malls that give JCPenney two entrances and put it dead center.

* Delta Plaza, Escanaba: Mounted onto the NE corner of the mall in a strange way, adjacent to a former anchor (former Red Owl that's now mall space).
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47of74
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by 47of74 »

At Northpark Mall in Davenport, Iowa the JC Penny store is the middle anchor tenant rather than being at the end.
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Re: JCPenney mall locations

Post by Swifty »

Citadel Mall in Charleston, SC is an interesting case for JCPenney, as it's had two incarnations.

The mall opened in 1981 with Sears at one end, Belk in the middle, and Thalhimer's at the other end.

In 1992, May Departments Stores bought out Thalhimer's, and sold the Charleston location to Dillards.

Two years later, Dillards moved to a new store in the rear of the mall.

And JCPenney moved into the former Thalhimer's.

However, in one of JCP's earlier financial struggles, they ended up closing the store in 2001. It was torn down and replaced with a Target.

Belk built a new store next to Dillard's in the rear, and sold their previous store to Parisian.

In 2006, Belk bought Parisian. And rather than have two stores at the mall, they ended up selling their original location to JCPenney the next year. And despite Citadel Mall dying a slow death from the inside out (it has about a 30-40% vacancy rate, yet maintains all 5 anchors), JCP is apparently doing well enough that they are remodeling it.

So far it's survived its second chance.
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