Macy's Comes to the Triad.

[cityboi]

The 2 hechts stores in Greensboro and the one in Hanes Mall have officially become Macy's. Many say Macy's has lost its luster and is no longer an upscale chain such as Nordstoms. What do you all think?

[partial]

It's a level below Nordstroms or Saks, but it will be a step up from Hecht's. The problem with Macy's is that its merchandise can vary widely between stores...from high end to something more akin to a Hecht's.

[StevenRocks]

The 2 hechts stores in Greensboro and the one in Hanes Mall have officially become Macy's. Many say Macy's has lost its luster and is no longer an upscale chain such as Nordstoms. What do you all think?

Macy's has never been an upscale chain in the Nordstrom vein, but it's always held its own in the department store world. I think they have done some incremental changes to the local Hecht's stores that have helped, but it's a safe bet that if you weren't wowed before the conversion, you won't be impressed now.

The problem with Macy's is that its merchandise can vary widely between stores...from high end to something more akin to a Hecht's.

They're consistently inconsistent. While a lot of their stores are impressive, in some, all they did was replace the May private labels with Federated ones and put up new signs.

[blburton]

The 2 Macy's I've been to since I've moved to MD felt like Dillards (one at White Marsh and the other at the dying Owings Mills Mall). There were original Macy's stores. I guess I was expecting more out of them both. I must admit that I love the Macy's logo, though! White Marsh also has a Macy's home store with furnishings, etc. I didn't know they existed.

[JerseyBoy]

You can see some of my Macy*s conversion photos of the store in Winston at Hanes Mall in the "Notable Retail Developments in Winston-Salem" topic.

[blburton]

nice pics

You can see some of my Macy*s conversion photos of the store in Winston at Hanes Mall in the "Notable Retail Developments in Winston-Salem" topic.

[DigitalSky]

I think it will be interesting to see how these stores do.. I don't think we'll see any dramatic changes in sales from when they were Hecht's honestly.

[cityboi]

You can see some of my Macy*s conversion photos of the store in Winston at Hanes Mall in the "Notable Retail Developments in Winston-Salem" topic.

nice pics.....I love the logo too, probabally better than any department store logo I've seen. I think in the Triad Stores there might potentially be some remodeling inside The Macy's Store at Friendly Center in Greensboro. But the Building on the west side of Greensboro off of I-40 is very new so that Macy's location would likely see the differences in just the merchandise.

[StevenRocks]

The 2 Macy's I've been to since I've moved to MD felt like Dillards (one at White Marsh and the other at the dying Owings Mills Mall). There were original Macy's stores. I guess I was expecting more out of them both. I must admit that I love the Macy's logo, though! White Marsh also has a Macy's home store with furnishings, etc. I didn't know they existed.

Macy's moved out of its legacy stores at Owings Mills and White Marsh into the former Hecht's spaces. I'm not sure when you went to those Macy's but you may or may not have been in the original R.H. Macy Co.-built stores. Actually at White Marsh, the old Hecht's was located in an old Hutzler's, so as you might imagine, it gets complicated.

I've never found many big differneces between Hecht's and Macy's in the smaller markets. They're pretty similar. At Tysons Corner and Fair Oaks, actually, Hecht's used to be more upscale than Macy's, I thought.

Hecht's had a home store in White Marsh in part of the former Lord & Taylor, which was originally a Woodwrd & Lothrop. They did that at a lot of malls in the DC area, but barely sold furniture in North Carolian, with only a token section of rugs and mattresses at Hanes Mall until they were removed for poor sales. Macy's simply rebranded.

Okay, I'll stop

You can see some of my Macy*s conversion photos of the store in Winston at Hanes Mall in the "Notable Retail Developments in Winston-Salem" topic.

Wonderful. I may have to feature some of those on LiveMalls.

[StevenRocks]

I got to check out both Greensboro stores today.

-- Macy's Friendly Center is the winner of the two, with some meaningful merchandise enhancements, though the Federated displays seem somewhat out of place in the formerly rigid May format.

-- Macy's Wendover seems a little dowdy now. It doesn't do the sales volume of the Friendly Center store, so the merchandise was a little less spectaular and the displays were duller. Curiously, all the men's merchandise moved upstairs, so in place of the young men's and boys department downstairs is even more misses' moderate sportswear (I guess there wasn't enough ). Totally screwed up the dynamic of the former youth-oriented area downstairs.

I don't know whether this is dumb or cool, but there is now a Coke machine and snack machine in the middle of the cosmetics department at Macy's Wendover

[cityboi]

I got to check out both Greensboro stores today.

-- Macy's Friendly Center is the winner of the two, with some meaningful merchandise enhancements, though the Federated displays seem somewhat out of place in the formerly rigid May format.

-- Macy's Wendover seems a little dowdy now. It doesn't do the sales volume of the Friendly Center store, so the merchandise was a little less spectaular and the displays were duller. Curiously, all the men's merchandise moved upstairs, so in place of the young men's and boys department downstairs is even more misses' moderate sportswear (I guess there wasn't enough ). Totally screwed up the dynamic of the former youth-oriented area downstairs.

I don't know whether this is dumb or cool, but there is now a Coke machine and snack machine in the middle of the cosmetics department at Macy's Wendover

I think Macy's should build a new building in the Shops at Friendly. The current building looks old and outdated on the outside and its hard to read the Macy's sign on that brick wall.

[DigitalSky]

what should happen to the old building then?

[cityboi]

what should happen to the old building then?

Thats a good question. Demolish it and build a courtyard with restaurants. That would be nice.

[StevenRocks]

I think Macy's should build a new building in the Shops at Friendly. The current building looks old and outdated on the outside and its hard to read the Macy's sign on that brick wall.

I have to disagree. The Macy's is a classic store design. It's one of the last vestiges of the old shopping center and it does really well in that spot. The signs are another issue. They're totally wrong for the building and need to be replaced with white signs like Hecht's had.