Sears #2245 - Melbourne, FL - The End

Sears #2245

1050 S. Babcock St., Melbourne, FL

     This Sears store opened in 1968, coinciding with the opening of the neighboring (now dead) Brevard Mall, which featured Montgomery Ward and JCPenney as its anchors (more on that here, though). In 2015, this store was sold to Seritage Properties as part of SHC's controversial REIT deal, which is typically not a good sign for the long-term future of a Sears or Kmart store. Even with that being the case, this Sears location was supposedly a "Top 200" store from what a few employees told me, citing this Sears location had particularly strong sales in clothing. As usual, Eddie doesn't care about any of that, and this Sears store was marked for closure during SHC's initial bankruptcy filing in October 2018. Liquidation sales had begun here in late October 2018, with the store closing for good on January 6, 2019 at 1:45pm.

     Sunday, January 6, 2019 - Approximately 1:00pm: So the day has come. After a little over two months of liquidating, January 6, 2019 marked the last day in business for the Melbourne Sears store. With that being the case, I had to make my way over to this store for one last visit before this place closed for good. In today's post we'll wrap up my extensive coverage of the Melbourne Sears store as it went through the liquidation process, with some very sad photos of this once mighty Sears store...

     The signs in the window reinforce what I just said - this was the Melbourne Sears store's final day in operation after 50 years at this site.

     Heading inside, what do we find but, well, not much of anything. I didn't realize this at first, but I had arrived at this store about 45 minutes before the doors would close for the final time. With that being said, the merchandise picking weren't very extensive...

     In this photo, you can see all of the merchandise that remained - a small selection of ladies' bathing suits for 95% off located between the front doors and the register. That was it. There was no other merchandise for sale except for those bathing suits. Going to a store on its last day in business is a rather odd experience, seeing all the emptiness and the random merchandise that remains. 

     While some devoted bargain hunters dug through those remaining racks of bathing suits, I chose a different option - taking one last lap around the store before it was sealed off for good. Unlike many other closing sales, the empty parts of the sales floor here were not roped off on this final day. The entire sales floor was free to roam about, just like any other day of business here over the last 50 years. Here we're on the other side of the main front registers from the previous photo, looking toward the side entrance by the old optical department. Part of the jewelry counter can be seen poking out at the left side of this image too.

     Speaking of the jewelry counter, here it is. There wasn't any jewelry left to buy here, although two employees were sitting behind the jewelry counter chatting. At this point, there really wasn't much left for the employees to do but sit back and reminisce.

     Here's more of the empty women's clothing department, as seen from the transition into men's clothing.

     Turning around from where I took that previous image, here's a look into the former men's clothing department. Like every other department in this store, the men's section was completely empty.

      Nothing but tumbleweeds here now...

     Here's a look from children's clothing back toward the men's department. Some items from the fixture sale were spilling out into this area. Besides those bathing suits near the front entrance, fixtures were the only other items available for purchase here so close to the end.

     The empty children's clothing department, looking back toward housewares.

     A grand aisle of emptiness now...

      Here's a look back toward the main entrance, where a few people were lining up at the register with their 95% off bargains.

     This would have been the ladies' lingerie section I was standing in, looking toward shoes in the front left corner of the building.

     All sales final...if you could find anything left to buy, that is...

     Leaving some of these empty sections of the store behind us, let's head into the area where the fixture sales were being held. That's where the action begins to pick up once again.

     As you would expect at a retail liquidation, there were plenty of racks, shelves, stands, and tables for sale in the fixtures department.

     On the right side of this image was a floor sample mattress that someone had purchased in the days prior. Going into the final hour of the sale, the person who had bought the mattress had yet to come pick it up. There was an employee over here on the phone trying to get through to the person who had bought this, trying to inform the customer they had very little time left to get their mattress home!

     In between the racks and shelves and such, there were some more interesting items to be found amongst the fixture sale. For example, if you really wanted one of Sears' cash registers, this one could have been all yours for only $50! This was the first time I've ever seen the registers themselves as part of a Sears/Kmart liquidation, so they were really selling out to the bare walls here...

     I found this sign digging through a pile of junk on a cart that someone had dragged out for the fixture sale. Unfortunately I didn't buy this sign, which advertised reserved parking for purchase pickup customers. When I was here I was in the mindset of finding some classic Sears souvenirs to take home with me, so this sign didn't make the cut. However, the people running this fixture sale could have cared less if items had logos or trademarks on them, so I probably could have gotten this sign for 25 cents (the fixture manager's favorite price for everything I showed interest in buying). Honestly, the fixture sale here was one of the most laid back ones I've attended, with some of the friendliest staff too. I wish that was a more common occurrence to find, as I've heard some horror stories about buying fixtures from closing stores (including some negative experiences of my own too).

     Moving along into the hardware department, the fixture sale continued up this way with more random shelves, desks, tables and whatnot.

     The merchandise pickup entrance can be seen in the background of this photo, with the hardware department register just out of frame to my right.

     An example of some of the emptiness in one of this store's hardware aisles.

     This area would have been home to the large hardware items and lawnmowers during normal operations here.

     The empty seasonal department in the back right corner of this store is pictured here.

     Moving along to the appliance department, you can see that all of those were gone too, not even a stray floor model left for sale.

     The far right portion of the appliance department was still being used as a sold fixture pickup area.

     Leaving appliances, here's a look back into the men's clothing department, or better put, where the men's clothing used to be kept.

     We're almost out of time here at the Melbourne Sears store. 1:45pm is swiftly approaching...

     But before we exit, first, an announcement:

     "For your shopping convenience, Sears will not reopen tomorrow morning. And as always, thank you for shopping at Sears." This message was announced over the PA system quite a few times while I was here, which is what tipped me off to the fact that I was here so close to the end. And it was to the end I stayed, leaving this store with the last few shoppers a little after 1:45pm on January 6, 2019. I even watched as one of the employees ripped down the sign with the store's hours on the front door, replacing that sign with a note stating the store was now permanently closed 😢.

     So through those dark doors we must now go, as the Melbourne Sears store is now gone for good...

     ...empty, lifeless, and sealed up tight as you can see here. The above photo was taken about a week after this store closed for good. The Sears sign was removed shortly after the doors were locked for the last time, the labelscars painted over in fresh white paint. I'm actually surprised the Sears logo was taken down here, as many Sears and Kmart stores closed during the bankruptcy never had their signs taken down. Since I took this photo, the hurricane shutters over all the doors and windows on this building have been rolled down, sealing this place off from any vandals. As of May 2019, this building still sits vacant, a for lease sign now in front of the building facing the intersection of NASA Boulevard and Babcock Street. I think I've said this before, but my gut feeling is this building will either become home to offices of some kind, or be town down for offices of some kind. Most of the retail along this stretch of Babcock Street has succumbed to reuse as office space in recent years, and I feel this building will meet that same fate. I'd really like to be proven wrong though and see retail of some kind come back to this site, but at this point, who knows what will happen here.

     While my coverage of the closing of the Melbourne Sears store is now complete, I'll be keeping my eye on this property to see what exactly the future may hold for this old Sears building. Until that day comes, that's a wrap (at least from me) from the Melbourne Sears store. Hopefully it will be a long time before I have to do another store closing chronicle like this one again!

Anyway, until the next post,

AFB

Sears #2245 - Melbourne, FL - The Closing Continues

     Everything must go as the closing sale continues at the Melbourne Sears store! Jumping now into part 3 of my four part series on the closing of this store, things are going to start looking much more like a closing now than we saw last time...

Sears #2245

1050 S. Babcock St., Melbourne, FL

     This Sears store opened in 1968, coinciding with the opening of the neighboring (now dead) Brevard Mall, which featured Montgomery Ward and JCPenney as its anchors (more on that here, though). In 2015, this store was sold to Seritage Properties as part of SHC's controversial REIT deal, which is typically not a good sign for the long-term future of a Sears or Kmart store. Even with that being the case, this Sears location was supposedly a "Top 200" store from what a few employees told me, citing this Sears location had particularly strong sales in clothing. As usual, Eddie doesn't care about any of that, and this Sears store was marked for closure during SHC's initial bankruptcy filing in October 2018. Liquidation sales had begun here in late October 2018, with the store closing for good on January 6, 2019 at 1:45pm.

     Saturday, December 29, 2018 - Approximately 5:00pm: Returning to the Melbourne Sears store once again, we're jumping ahead six weeks from where my photos last left off. That may seem like a lot of time I had left to pass, but I wanted to begin the next portion of this series from where this closing really felt like a closing. In that span of six weeks I'd popped into this store a few times to walk around and check out the fixtures, but I was waiting for the right opportunity to take my next round of photos. The Christmas season now behind us, I figured this late December evening would be a nice chance pick up where I had left off, as the closing of the Melbourne Sears store continues...

     Getting ready to head inside once again, here we can see the countdown to the end is on...only 9 days left here according to the sign.

     Heading through the main entrance and turning to the right, here we find some large swaths of emptiness in what was formerly the women's clothing department. Yep, this sure looks much more like a closing now, the merchandise selection rapidly dwindling...

     One of the store's side entrances is clearly visible from this perspective now, helped by the fact that the women's clothing has been consolidated to a small area immediately surrounding the front doors.

     Next to that side entrance, we have our first decent look at the little space that was once home to the Optical department. In the last few posts from here we saw the signage for this space, but this is our first look at the Optical box itself. At this point well into the closing, the Optical department had been cleared out and chained off.

     Returning to the main aisle, we find more emptiness as the side of the jewelry counter tries to peek out from the left side of this photo. That too was rather empty when I walked by it.

     And not only was the jewelry counter mostly empty, most of the counter itself had been sold off too.

     Continuing our theme of emptiness, here's a look into the empty portion of the men's clothing department. What was left of the men's clothing had been consolidated into the section just out of frame to my left.

     As usual, plenty of store closing signage was taped to the windows, just like we see here at the men's clothing side entrance.

     The empty cubbies made for an interesting sight in the men's department. The jeans used to be placed in these cubbies.

     Moving back to the main aisle, we can see what was left of the men's clothing selection from this perspective.

     The children's clothing selection was fairly thin too, but seemed to be one of the fuller departments left in this store with 9 days to go. Some of the fixtures sale area had begun to creep into this part of the store too, those empty racks to my left being part of the fixture sale.

     Leaving the children's clothing department, here's a look back toward the main entrance, around which most of the remaining merchandise was consolidated.

     There were a few pairs of shoes left in the aisles to my left, but the aisles by the door were completely empty.

     It was slim pickings in the housewares department as well, with all the remaining housewares condensed to the endcaps on the main aisle. The fixture sale also began to encroach on this area as well, with that visible to my left.

     Turning around, here's a better look at how the small appliance, furniture, and mattress department had been turned into a home for fixture sales. The fixture sale also continued back into the hardware department. They really had a lot of fixtures to sell off here. Most of that stuff was large fixtures and other things I didn't need, but I was able to dig myself out a few small souvenirs over the course of this closing. However, I'll talk more about the stuff I found in my next and final post about this store.

     Even with the fixtures sale taking up most of the former mattress department, a few display mattresses were still available for sale. Those mattresses were all shoved into this part of the department, near the aisle that cuts across to children's and men's clothing.

     Here's a better look at the fixture sale that was going on. At this point in the closing, I think there were more fixtures for sale than actual merchandise! Anyway, that old desk to my left looks interesting. You never know what gets left behind in these old desks, so why not open the drawers and poke around inside of it?

     To be honest, I don't remember exactly what desks I found these two papers in. They came from two different desks, and there were at least 10 desks for sale scattered throughout the fixture department. The first relic I found inside the desks I poked through was this telephone directory, listing the extensions for all the different departments, as well as the phone numbers for some other Sears services. This directory was relatively modern though, probably made within the last decade to reflect the phone system in this store in its final years. However, this next item I found in a desk lives up to the name of "relic" much better:

     Moving along to a different desk, it's yet another telephone directory - this one being much, much older than the last one we saw though. I really hope that no one was using this directory in recent times, as the extension numbers, while similar, don't quite match up with the extensions mentioned on the modern directory. For example, if you wanted the assistant manager, this directory says to dial 203. On the modern directory, dialing extension 203 would have gotten you the Merritt Island store! For an idea of how old this directory is, it references the Cocoa Sears as one of the nearby stores. The Cocoa Sears relocated to Merritt Island in 1989, although I feel this sheet is probably much older than that.

     Clearly, winning an award for increased sales and profits won't save a store from closure - these awards just became one more thing to drag out for the fixture sale.

     Behind the old mattress department was this little room. I don't know if this room served any particular purpose, but it did contain an emergency exit complete with a Sears logo.

     Heading into the hardware department, here's one last overview looking back into the fixture sales area.

     Entering the hardware department, the old H&R Block and hearing aid center become visible once again. To my left and inside the old H&R Block/hearing aid spaces were yet more fixtures - certainly no shortage of those here.

     The hardware department was quite empty by this time in the closure process. There were some random large items and a few thin aisles of hand tools left, but the selection was certainly picked over.

     The seasonal and sporting goods department had been reduced to nothing more than three ladders for sale.

     Leaving the seasonal and sporting goods department behind us, we'll take this time to stroll through the little corridor into appliances and back around to the fixture sale. However unlike the song in the background of the video says, I don't think there is a remedy for Sears...

     Turning around from where that video ended, here we have a view looking back into the appliance department. I like the way the perspective of this photo turned out.

     Moving along into the appliance department, what was left of the merchandise was consolidated into the part of the department where I was standing for this photo. The merchandise remaining consisted mainly of display appliances, with what little backstock that remained being dragged out into empty portions of the sales floor. Going further toward the wall and the old exterior entrance, the appliance department turned into a holding area for fixtures that had already been purchased.

     The fixtures holding area was roped off, but I was able to get a few photos of this portion of the store from the other side of the rope.

     Heading back toward the men's clothing department, here's another look toward the fixture holding area.

     I think this photo is a pretty good summary of what a closing sale is all about...

     Before leaving this store, here's one last look at the merchandise that remained in the front portion of the building. As we've seen from this tour, the merchandise visible here made up about 85% of the merchandise that was left in the building.

     With the merchandise thinning out, that did provide me with an opportunity to get a better photo of the raised squiggly ceiling over the front doors.

     And to finish out this post, here's a look at the now-closed Sears Auto Center. The Auto Center lasted about a month or so into the closing process of the main store, closing about a month and a half before the main store.

     With part 3 of my Melbourne Sears closing series out of the way, that means I have one more part to go in my continuing coverage of this store: the final day. That's going to be a fun (but sad) post - probably the most exciting part of this entire series. Look for that to come to the blog soon!

So until the next post,

AFB