Von Maur

As department stores trim their portfolios, the nation’s malls are being transformed.   

Von Maur has opened its first location in Wisconsin.   The family-owned company opened a 150,000-sq.-ft. store at The Corners of Brookfield in Brookfield, Wisconsin.   Von Maur has been expanding with its eye on a national footprint. After expanding beyond its Midwestern footprint in 2011 with the opening of its first location in Georgia, Von Maur has since grown in additional new states including New York, Alabama and Oklahoma.   

Burlington has been announced as the replacement for Sears at PREIT’s Magnolia Mall in Florence, South Carolina. Earlier this month, Dick’s Sporting Goods and Von Maur were introduced as new tenants of Sears spaces that had been recaptured by the Philadelphia-based developer.  

The Iowa-based Von Maur department store chain will be installing a 90,000-sq.-ft. location at PREIT’s Woodland Mall in Grand Rapids, Michigan, in a space to be vacated by Sears. A 2019 opening is planned.   A 145-year-old, family-owned chain of 31 stores in 14 states, Von Maur’s offerings aspired to the high end with brands like Eileen Fisher, Coach, and Tommy Bahama.  

One of Minnesota’s highest-volume malls is about to get a $76 million renovation that will give it new retail space and sight lines and – more rare these days – a new department store tenant.   Rosedale Center, a 1.14-million-sq.-ft. property situated between the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, will soon break ground for a two-level Von Maur store and parking deck with 1,100 spaces, according to owner JLL. Macy’s and J.C. Penney already do business there.  

Von Maur is slowly expanding its Dry Goods women’s specialty store format.   The retailer has opened a 4,000-sq.-ft. store at Woodland Mall. Since launching in 2010, Dry Goods has grown to 19 locations across six states.   Dry Good’s name and  store design were inspired by Von Maur's heritage as a dry goods store, dating back to 1872 in downtown Davenport, Iowa.    

Not all department stores are scaling back on their portfolio.    Von Maur Department Stores has opened its third location in the state of Georgia, a 165,000-sq.-ft. store at the Mall of Georgia in Buford.  

Macy’s may be flailing, but the department store icon can’t be accused of taking its struggles lying down. As sales were falling 7.4% in the first quarter of 2016 (numbers that represented the fifth straight quarter of declining sales, and capped off a year in which Macy’s stock prices were nearly halved at 47%), Macy’s continues moving forward on plans to roll out its new off-price Backstage concept – both as a series of new stand-alone stores and as in-store locations integrated inside a number of existing Macy’s stores.