Walt Whitman Shops in Huntington Station in talks to ‘diversify’ retail, life-style expertise

Walt Whitman Shops, which was house to the final Saks Fifth Avenue retailer on Long Island, is in talks to “diversify the retail and lifestyle experience” on the Huntington Station mall, the property’s landlord stated.

The Saks Fifth Avenue retailer at 230 Walt Whitman Rd. closed in May after the retailer’s troubled mum or dad firm expanded its listing of retailer shutdowns after a chapter submitting. 

“Saks Fifth Avenue at Walt Whitman Shops has closed as part of their bankruptcy restructuring, and we appreciate the role the brand has played at the center,” Indianapolis-based Simon Property Group, which owns Walt Whitman Shops, advised Newsday in an emailed assertion.

The landlord stated July 1 that it is “actively engaged in discussions with a number of exciting new concepts that will further enhance and diversify the retail and lifestyle experience at Walt Whitman Shops.” Additional particulars can be launched quickly, Simon stated.

The Town of Huntington’s planning division is unaware of any current functions or proposals to fill the area, Huntington Town spokeswoman Christine Geed stated Tuesday. 

Saks’ closing leaves Walt Whitman Shops, which leans high-end, with two massive vacancies created by the exits of upscale division shops, together with Lord & Taylor.

The Lord & Taylor retailer, which opened within the mall in 1998 at 120,000 sq. ft, closed in 2020 after the luxurious retailer filed for chapter.

The shuttered Saks Fifth Avenue retailer occupied almost 100,000 sq. ft.

The mall’s two remaining department shops and largest tenants are Macy’s and Bloomingdale’s.

“Department stores in general have been in decline for a long time in the U.S.,” as customers want to purchase immediately from manufacturers fairly than multi-brand department shops, stated David Swartz, client fairness analyst at Morningstar Research Services LLC, a monetary companies agency in Chicago.

While high-end malls carry out properly, struggling properties are being revamped with open-air layouts or diversified tenant lineups that lean extra upscale, Newsday beforehand reported.

Large former division retailer areas on Long Island can even stay vacant for years, leaving questions on what sort of outlets can substitute them, stated Jared Koeck, affiliate director of market analytics at CoStar Group, an Arlington, Virginia-based supplier of economic actual property data.

Because of their massive measurement, “it can be more difficult or time-consuming to find a suitable tenant to backfill the space,” he said.

Still, Long Island’s mall vacancy rate as of the second quarter was 6.3%, below the national average of 8.5%, Koeck said.

There are also alternative options for filling vacant spaces at malls, beyond adding retailers, Koeck said.

In Stamford, Connecticut, for example, a former Saks OFF 5TH, which is an off-price store, was transformed into a pickleball facility in 2023, he said. 

At Samanea New York in Westbury, the property’s owner continues pushing to transform the mall into a “lifestyle destination” with more tenants selling experiences than clothes.

After undergoing a $30 million revamp in 2021 designed to revitalize the struggling site, the property’s occupancy rate has risen to 76%, as tenants offering laser tag, rock climbing, miniature golf, arts and crafts, indoor pickleball courts and other activities have opened in the past few years.

Saks Global, the parent company of Saks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman, announced on June 26 it had rebranded as Exemplar Luxury Group after emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy with less debt and a smaller retail footprint.

The parent company, under the new ownership, cut its debt by 75% and the company has “the liquidity necessary to support long-term growth and profitability,” according to a statement from the company.

Before Saks Global filed for chapter safety in January, there have been 33 Saks shops and 36 Neiman Marcus shops, a Bergdorf Goodman retailer on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan and roughly 70 off-price Saks Off 5TH shops, in keeping with the corporate.

There at the moment are 49 shops remaining, six of that are in New York: two Neiman Marcus areas in White Plains and within the Roosevelt Field mall in Uniondale on Long Island; a Saks Fifth Avenue flagship retailer and a Bergdorf Goodman in Manhattan; and two Saks OFF 5TH shops in Westbury Plaza in Uniondale and Woodbury commons in Central Valley, upstate New York, an Exemplar spokeswoman stated.

Newsday’s Tory N. Parrish and The Associated Press contributed to this story.