Ann Taylor has closed at Westfield Montgomery Mall in Bethesda. This store managed to survive the 2017 purge of Ann Taylor store closures, as well as the pandemic, so it's surprising to see it go now. Yet Ann Taylor stores in more-business-friendly and economically-vibrant Tysons, Pentagon City, Fair Oaks Mall, and Dulles Town Center remain open.
It's tough to remain a going concern when the local economy is stagnant, and ever-increasing taxes and fees eat away at already-slim profit margins. Ann Taylor appears to be the latest victim. All the store workers now find themselves unemployed. Let's say it together: "Moribund Montgomery County."
15 comments:
shocked they didn't close their dulles town center store first - that mall is capital DEAD
Moribund is such a great word. When are they going to blow up that place? What I mean is, when are they expected to begin their mall reimagine which I think you've reported on before? There's already plans drawn up to create a mix of mall and town center a la Pick and Rose. They need to shake that old mall up.
Maybe retail at local store do not have a pleasant shopping experience. The last time that I went shopping at Westfield MM I saw lots of disorganized racks of "discounted" polyester clothes. We mainly go for the movie theater.
The parent company is also closing Talbots and Soma at the mall. I don't think the county economy has anything to do with it. Either mall management overplayed its hand by overcharging for lease renewals, or the mall pushed them out to "freshen up" the store mix. For a while it seemed like they wanted Montgomery Mall to be Tysons East. Now it's starting to look more like Wheaton West.
But an Ann Taylor Factory store opened in Federal Plaza on Rockville Pike. There is a J Crew Factory store in Congressional Plaza, also on Rockville Pike.
The parent company is a private equity group that bought Talbot's,Soma, Ann Taylor and others.
They are closing many locations not just Mont. Mall.
8:00AM Wheaton Plaza is better - has a Target and a better movie theater with recliners (before AMC adds them at Montgomery).
11:32: The interesting question is, why are all the other DC-area Ann Taylor stores staying open and Montgomery County's was closed?
11:03: "Factory," "Outlet," "Rack," and other modifiers denote a downmarket version of an upscale brand, which makes sense given our moribund county economy.
Robert,
The JCrew mentioned is terrible so is the Dick's Sporting Goods. The Land's End isn't great either but decent and still full retail not outlet, discount, etc.
@ JAC 12:52: Many people I know love the JCrew Factory store;it is especially useful for picking up or returning mail order items. The staff is great. The Dick's is really strange and seems to have very little merchandise. Not worth a trip.
Dyer@ 11:32 - Wait for it...wait for it...
@12:52 - Grumpy old men are never satisfied. These are outlets getting rid of merch that didn't sell in the primary stores, don't expect to see top of the line goods there. Educate yourself. The LE is an outlet as well, they don't actually have full brick n' mortar any longer. once they partnered with Sears those days ended.
I disagree with you Mr. Dyer. The economy in Montgomery County is so "bad" - in this instance you are talking about Bethesda and the area around Montgomery Mall - that most detached homes cost $1 million or more. Please, you don't know what you are talking about and you sound like some Republican who wants lower taxes for businesses no matter what.
The income and educational level of the Tyson's area is practically identical to Bethesda. The only difference is that the owners of Montgomery Mall just ran the place into the ground through mismanagement. And because the area and the patrons of the mall have become more "diverse", I think that the mall owners just stopped trying to keep the upscale image of the mall. That type of racist behavior (as you noted when retailers offer a downmarket version of upscale brands) often happens in diverse areas even when the income level of an area is much higher than the national average. Just ask the folks in Prince George's County about that.
1:28: There isn't a direct relationship between the health of the economy and housing prices. Housing has been expensive in Bethesda for a long time. But over the first 3 decades of this century, we have seen the County economy tanking.
There have been numerous statistics from the US Bureau of Labor Standards that clearly show MoCo falling behind most other jurisdictions in the area in job creation, business starts, business growth, and other fundamental benchmarks. In at least one recent year, Prince George's County created more jobs than we did. It's been over a quarter-century since we attracted a new major corporate HQ here. Many others we had have left.
A key difference between Tysons and Bethesda is seen by simply driving through the Tysons area on the Beltway at night. The sky is filled with lit-up logos of all the new corporate HQs that have opened there in the last 15 years alone.
6:09 - good to know.
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