Big Kmart to Big Lots to Big Closure - Big Lots #5444 - Orlando, FL (South Semoran)

Kmart #4390 / Big Lots #5444

1801 S. Semoran Boulevard, Orlando, FL - Azalea Plaza

Today's post is a presentation of Orange County retail

     As you've probably seen over the last few weeks and months, Big Lots has some big problems. Starting off by closing nearly 300 stores this summer, followed by the recent (and expected by most) bankruptcy announcement, with a rumored closure of another 250 stores by January (of which 96 were recently revealed - see the lists here: 9/13 and 9/20), none of that sounds great. However, as part of the bankruptcy filing (and mentioned in the linked article), Big Lots has lined up a bidder, Nexus Capital Management, who wants to keep the company around as a going concern. Nexus' bid is pending a formal auction of the sale of Big Lots' assets in October where someone else could potentially outbid them, but at least there is interest in keeping Big Lots around in some form, rather than seeing yet another retail chain fall victim to the "retail apocalypse". As you've probably seen (and read about on AFB and MFR through the years), Big Lots really lost their way over the last decade, shifting from being "The Closeout Store" to "The Store with an Identity Crisis", shifting almost every year in direction of what they wanted to sell and what shoppers they wanted to target. It's never a good sign when a store doesn't want to know what it wants to be (remember when Scotty's tried to become a dollar store and how well that worked?), and in a way, Big Lots' recent problems were more of a self-inflicted wound than anything from all those years of misdirection. If the bid to keep Big Lots as a going concern is successful, I think Big Lots is going to take this bankruptcy as a huge wake-up call, for reasons I'll discuss in more detail throughout this post, as long as all these changes aren't too little too late. Anyway, now that we've had that brief recap on the big events beguiling Big Lots, let's talk a little more about the store we'll be seeing today:

     While you might not recognize it in the present, we've actually seen this very building on MFR before (well, technically on my old flickr account, which MFR later replaced, but MFR carries on that page's lineage). The building we're looking at originally housed the South Semoran Kmart store, which opened in 1971 and closed in August 2011. When we last toured this site, the property was nothing more than an abandoned Kmart husk, one of many that dotted the Orlando region in the mid-2010's. At the time of my original visit in 2015, early prep work on gutting the old Kmart building had begun, starting with the asbestos remediation seen in that photoset. Work at this site eventually stalled until 2020, where after some heavy remodeling and the removal of a few Bill Murray posters, the old Kmart came back to life as "Azalea Plaza". Azalea Plaza would become home to two new tenants - Big Lots (who relocated from a smaller store across the street) and Club 4 Fitness, a new gym. Big Lots was the first of the two tenants to open on August 28, 2021, with the gym opening sometime after. I visited this Big Lots for the first time shortly after it opened to see what it was all about, and we'll start off by touring this store as it looked in a more grand opening-like state.

     While Big Lots was still meddling around with what kind of a store they wanted to be in 2021, things at that time looked much better for the company. Having experienced a nice boost in revenue from the "decorating boom" caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Big Lots was on an expansion spree following a new store lull for much of the mid-2010's. With its new "Store of the Future" format and a desire to show off what the "new" Big Lots was all about, the company set forth on a large remodeling campaign that aimed to upgrade much of the store fleet to the new format, and replace older, smaller stores where the new format would not fit, or where there was no room for the full furniture selection that was the company's bread and butter at the time. The Big Lots we'll be touring today did exactly that, replacing a small mid-1990's store across the street that had no room for furniture outside of some mattresses and bookshelves. By the time 2021 had come around, Big Lots had made a few small tweaks to their "Store of the Future" design - those small changes being something we'll take a look at today, the first of which becomes very apparent as we step through the front doors:

     Stepping through the doors, "The Lot" is the first thing to greet us upon entering. With its emphasis on purple signage, "The Lot" was designed to stand out as the focal point amongst the departments around it. "The Lot" was crafted in late-2019 before making its chain-wide rollout in 2020 as a special closeout department that was supposed to let some of Big Lots' roots as a closeout store show. "The Lot" featured assorted buyouts or themes based on the season, and also featured special limited-time collaborations with the likes of Disney and Mario Lopez too. "The Lot" seemed to be Big Lots first inkling that straying away from closeouts was a bad idea, although it seems to have taken a bankruptcy filing to finally get that message through.

     If you go to Big Lots' official bankruptcy website, bigstepforbiglots.com, one of the first statements you'll see is this: "Big Lots is taking important steps as we return to our roots, focused on owning the extreme bargain space, and delivering unmistakable value and exceptional savings to our loyal customers." I see that sentence as a carefully worded admission by the marketing department that Big Lots made a huge mistake straying away from being a closeout store. If you've been looking at Big Lots' marketing lately too, you'll notice it changed quite a bit. After ten years of being something they weren't, if you go to Big Lots' website today, you'll see it now embraces a more cartoon-ish look with emphasis on "bargains" and "buyouts" all over the place - words that mostly disappeared from Big Lots' vocabulary in recent years. Even more shocking to me was seeing this on their website:

      Not only is there now a prominently displayed "Closeouts" tab on the website, but reappearing after a nearly 25-year hiatus we see Closeout Man - Big Lots' cartoon caped crusader mascot from the 1990's! In addition to the website, matching signage and promotional material is also being rolled out to Big Lots' go-forward locations, featuring Closeout Man and the new cartoon-ish "Ollies-esque" design. I've also heard that Big Lots is totally scrapping formal shelf tags and planograms (which in addition to those Reddit comments, was told to me by some employees I spoke with during one of my recent Big Lots visits) and returning to the "shove the stuff anywhere" approach to merchandising, which was the norm at Big Lots years ago when their merchandise selection constantly changed (similar to what Ollie's still does today). While it remains to be seen if Closeout Man can come to Big Lots' rescue following the bankruptcy, let's turn our attention back to 2021 to see what Big Lots' attempt at closeouts was before having to revive characters from the past:

     While I was browsing "The Lot" during my 2021 visit, I spotted these picnic blankets that were specifically branded for "The Lot", which I thought was interesting. However, bankruptcy is no picnic in the park though...

     The back wall of "The Lot" was home to clothes, which like the rest of "The Lot", rotated out with the seasons. This clothing in the lot was in addition to the main aisles of clothing located on the other side of the store.

     Leaving "The Lot", the remainder of the front wall is home to a lot of decorative rugs. The majority of the right side of the store is home to housewares, beginning with these few aisles along the front, then turning to follow the right side of the store.

     Being in a slice of an old Kmart, we do get a few architectural anomalies from such a conversion, like these oddly placed columns very close to the shelves along the right wall. The columns certainly make things a bit awkward for wanting to pull anything behind them off the shelf!

     Being that Big Lots was going all-in with housewares in the late 2010's and early 2020's, it should be no surprise that they dedicated one third of the non-furniture salesfloor to that merchandise. The "Store of the Future" design was very in-tune with pushing Big Lots four core focus areas of the time - which were furniture (prominently placed in the center of the store), home, food and seasonal. Everything else was pretty much just an afterthought.

     While this store follows the original "Store of the Future" design, another change Big Lots made in the early 2020's with the design was the wall signage. The original "Store of the Future" decor used a more simplistic signage package featuring the department name and some stock photos. Come the early 2020's, Big Lots switched to a more elaborate and whimsical signage package, which is the one we see in here. The new signage wrapped around the entire salesfloor, featuring the department names and various slogans to match. This signage package lasted for about 2 years before Big Lots, as indecisive as they've been, changed it again about a year ago with the rollout of their "Be a Bigionaire" marketing campaign. Another one of the closing Big Lots stores I've visited had that most recent decor, which we'll eventually see, but here's some photos of it I found elsewhere online if you want a preview.

     As Big Lots began dabbling with closeouts again in the early 2020's, they also began to highlight assorted "Big Buys" like these here in the laundry and cleaning aisle.

     From the back right corner of the store, here's a look back toward "The Lot" and what we've covered so far.

     Pet supplies (or as Big Lots was calling this department "For Fur Babies") were located in the back right corner itself, with some paper products back here in the corner too.

     Turning around from that last photo, we see most of the back wall is home to paper products, with larger items like multi-packs of paper towels and toilet paper on the industrial steel racking against the wall. The grocery aisles can be seen opposite.

     The main back actionway had assorted seasonal and promo displays for health and beauty as well as grocery in the middle of the aisle, with the back of the furniture department just out of view behind those displays.

     Speaking of furniture, here's a look at it from the back aisle, although we'll take a closer look at furniture toward the end of our tour.

     The updated wall signage in this store came across as much nicer than the original variant (at least to me), probably because it covered up more of the blank white space on the walls.

     The back left corner of the store was home to clothing and electronics (the latter of which's department sign got a bit bent making the turn in the corner).

     While Big Lots has dabbled with selling clothes off and on over the years, this was a product line the company completely pulled out of by the late 2000's (outside of a small display of socks and underwear, which had been kept). After a decade or so hiatus, Big Lots brought a full clothing department back around 2020, starting with a display of novelty T-Shirts that eventually morphed into roughly two dedicated aisles of clothes.

     Turning our attention to the left side of the store now, here's a look at the left side actionway, home to the remaining departments like electronics and clothes (which we just saw), hardware, toys, office supplies, and seasonal. Also, it appears I caught the corner of the CD and DVD display rack in my photo too, the only place where you'd be able to find Bill Murray in this building now!

     Moving along the left actionway, we see in the middle of the aisle the T-shirt display that started Big Lots' recent renewed interest in selling clothes. To my right though are toys, and we'll cut down one of those aisles for a look at the left wall:

     Well, I guess those plastic bins could be used as a toy box! While toys themselves are located in the main aisles behind me, hardware and storage tubs occupied the left wall itself.

     Eventually, the plastic tubs transition into seasonal, another one of Big Lots 4 "core" departments from the late 2010's and early 2020's.

     "Price is what you pay, value is what you get, but closeouts are what we want!" At least, I think that last part was implied on the wall sign! Out in the main aisle, some leftover back to school merchandise was shoved onto a display, as well as the last little bit of summer merchandise and some luggage (because why not?) as Big Lots readied the seasonal department for Halloween and Christmas (the two soon-to-be-approaching holidays during my visit, which are also soon to be approaching as well when this post goes live! Where did the year go?!).

     Christmas balls, bows, and trees across from rakes, outdoor rugs, and gazebos. That might sound weird to most, but that's just the seasonal departments of most stores in the fall and winter in Florida!

     With my back to the pop-up gazebo display, this look into the front left corner of the building looks a little more holly jolly! About half of the space on the left side of the building was dedicated to seasonal goods, which makes sense knowing Big Lots considers seasonal one of its most important departments.

     From seasonal, here's one last look at the left actionway, as we finish up our tour with a quick perusal of the furniture department:

     While seasonal got a nice chunk of salesfloor space, furniture is clearly the star of the show, being placed front and center as well as accounting for half of the overall sales space in the building.

     While Big Lots had a good thing going with furniture for a while, using that department to differentiate themselves from their competition and become one of the largest furniture sellers in the nation, furniture is also part of the reason Big Lots is in the mess they are in right now. As I mentioned in previous Big Lots coverage, the primary upholstered furniture supplier Big Lots used, called United Furniture, went out of business suddenly in late 2022. That left Big Lots in a big predicament, as once the small supply of furniture Big Lots already had on hand ran out, that was it until they could work out a deal to procure more furniture from a new supplier, a deal that could take months. That hiccup in the furniture department led to rough furniture sales for the company in 2023, and being that furniture was such a focus for Big Lots, losing those sales was a big hit on top of the other economic factors going against the chain.

     Overall though, the furniture departments in these modern Big Lots stores look very nice, and the placement of furniture in the center of the store makes the department more presentable overall (compared to older stores where furniture gets shoved into a corner or a separate storefront).

     Another item Big Lots stopped selling in the early 2010's just to bring it back again in the early 2020's (and then stop selling again shortly after) were televisions. Seen here in the furniture department was a display of 42" and 65" Westinghouse TVs, which Big Lots was pushing quite a bit back in 2021. While Westinghouse was a big name in electronics back in the day, I believe the name has mostly been relegated to "cheap" TVs and electronics these days.

     Hopefully you didn't get too comfortable in the furniture department, as this is my last photo of the area as we get ready to finish our tour.

     Big Lots' check lanes are located on the opposite side of those gray shelves, featuring the company's modern queue system that rolled out chain-wide around 2020.

     Our final 2021 interior photo looks back at the front end from the vicinity of the entryway and "The Lot". We'll be back inside this store before long, but first, let's finish up some business outside:

     The modern exterior of this former Kmart isn't anything super exciting architecturally, and the gray and white paint scheme isn't helping make things any more exciting either.

     Leaving Big Lots, we'll take a walk to the other end of the building to see what that part of the building looks like now. Nearly a decade ago, the scene from this same perspective looked so much different.

     At the time of my visit, Big Lots' new neighbor, Club 4 Fitness, had yet to open. Work was still being done to get the new gym ready, with this photo taken looking toward the gym's future main entrance.

     If you want to see what this part of the building looks like now that the gym is open, here's a photo of Club 4 I found on Google. Compared to some of the other gym chains popping up like weeds everywhere (like Planet Fitness, Crunch, EoS, etc.), Club 4 is actually a relatively small chain of gyms with only 40 locations primarily in the Southeastern United States, with most of those locations clustered in the Mid-South region and the chain's home state of Mississippi (the chain was founded in Ridgeland, MS). The Orlando Club 4 Fitness is one of only two outposts of the chain in Florida right now, with the other Florida Club 4 location being in Melbourne.

     Off to the left side of the Big Lots space was the former home of the Kmart garden center, which is now just a fenced off grassy area. I could see this plot eventually becoming home to another small store or restaurant eventually, but as of 2024, the old garden center site still looks exactly as we see above.

     From my 2021 visit, here's one final photo before we jump to the present, where we'll notice a new, brightly colored addition to the gray facade of this building:

     Now moving into my 2024 visit to this store, we see that a "CLOSING" banner now sits above the main entrance. As part of Big Lots' troubles leading up to the recent bankruptcy filing, this location, as well as 2 others in Orlando (South OBT and Union Park), and 294 total stores nationwide were announced to be closing in the summer of 2024. Many of the stores Big Lots chose for closure in the pre-bankruptcy closing waves were newer locations from the recent expansion spree, which this store was one of (even though it was officially a relocation). As part of the "Store of the Future" expansion, Big Lots was relocating away from their older, less prominently located (but with cheaper rent) locations in favor of new stores in prominent big box centers. While the newer stores were better located, they came with higher rent - a big jump from the ex-supermarket boxes and older past-their-prime retail strips that Big Lots originally targeted in the 1990's and 2000's. It appears to most that a lot of the stores Big Lots chose to close in that wave were just too nice and too expensive to run, and this article I found provides an interesting analysis of some of the trends from the recent closure wave as well, in addition to predicting what may come in the rumored upcoming bankruptcy closure waves too.

     Stepping inside, it's certainly messier and more chaotic in here than what we saw in my 2021 photos, but what else should we expect from a store closing sale? These photos of the closing were taken not too far into the closing sale, about two weeks in if I remember right. As such, besides the famous tacky yellow and red "Nothing Held Back" and "Everything Must Go" signs hanging from the ceiling and a mess or two, nothing had changed much compared to my original photos.

     Decor to adore, for 10% off too. Also, having visited the closing so early on, the deals weren't all that great either. I think the maximum percentage off while I was here was 30% off (and there was hardly anything with that high of a discount too), so Big Lots quarterly 20% off everything sale was actually a better deal than this closing sale was starting off with!

     A little messier here on the right side wall, but nothing too different compared to my first visit.

     A lot of space in the main actionways were being cleared out for overstock furniture, including some random box stock pulled out from the back too.

     The closing sale deals were quite terrible in the back of the store departments. Cleaning and health and beauty items were only marked down 5% off, and food was totally exempt from the closing markdowns at this point in the sale.

     I think I was trying to take a photo of the furniture department here, but that rack of food got in the way!

     Some toys were used to fill in empty space along the back wall, and those were actually marked down 20% too - one of the better deals to be had on this day!

     To our left, the T-shirt display was a total disaster, but that's to be expected at a closing sale (and being one of the few 30% off items, I can see why rummaging through that rack was popular!). Toss a few shoes on the floor, and this closing sale would really be off to a good start!

     Back in the late 2000's, Big Lots used to have a feature on their website called the "Closeout Museum", where people could submit photos of the weird items Big Lots would get as closeouts. My contribution to the Closeout Museum today is this Chia Pet Minion, "Kevin", to be exact, a fun and eclectic addition to a garden-scape for the Despicable Me fanatic in your life. When it comes to Chia Pets, there's certainly no shortage of weird ones out there these days, and I'm sure before long Big Lots will be getting more Chia Pet options for your Christmas gag gifting pleasure.

     Being so early in the closing sale, there really weren't any empty areas of the store yet, and it seemed like the salesfloor was actually overflowing with stuff rather than there being a lack thereof.

     A quick photo from inside the furniture department will wrap up our interior coverage from the closing of Big Lots #5444 before heading outside once again:

     As for what the future holds for Big Lots, it certainly seems like more store closures are coming as part of the bankruptcy restructuring per all the reports. Since the bankruptcy filing (and as of the original publication of this post), an additional 96 closures have been announced, with 4 of those new closures located in Florida (in Cutler Bay/Miami, Delray Beach, Jacksonville Beach, and Pembroke Pines). If any more closure waves appear (the odds of which seem likely), I'll be sure to update my Big Lots Floridian closure list appropriately. As for the "Big" picture, Big Lots seems pretty confident profitability can return by 2025 once all the restructuring is done and the bad stores are closed. This article goes into more detail about how Big Lots wants to proceed going forward, and it seems like after many years of messing around in areas they shouldn't have been going into, the company will finally try to become "The Closeout Store" again. If all goes as stated, I'm quite interested to follow Big Lots' turnaround plan over the coming months, and see if the mighty powers of Closeout Man can save this distraught retailer, or if Closeout Man has finally met his match and must bow out to Captain Ollie.

     To finish this post, after I pulled out of the Big Lots parking lot and was waiting at the light to make my turn onto Curry Ford, I spotted on the other side of the road a person in the bus stop shelter holding a sign advertising the Big Lots liquidation even across the street. The parking lot you see behind the bus stop is that of former Albertsons #4347, still going strong as a Sedano's, and busy as ever on this Saturday afternoon.

     While that completes my coverage of Big Lots #5444, I have more Big Lots closing coverage for the future too, and depending on where any future closures may appear, we'll have to see if I'll be adding more to my backlog as well! I'll look into what I want to write about on MFR next, but if nothing else, more to come on AFB next weekend, so be sure to come back and check that out!

So until the next post,

AFB