By Bryan Bacher
Clarence’s Eastern Hills Mall has been taking some hard hits lately. Just recently, one of the most popular chain upscale men’s stores, Brooks Brothers, closed their 346 store as a part of their plan to close all 12 of their 346 stores, the world-famous men’s store’s line of stores featuring slightly cheaper line of apparel then their regular Brooks Brothers stores.
Also, Dave & Buster’s is leaving Eastern Hills to open a larger, two-level location at the more popular Walden Galleria. Deb, a chain women’s clothing store, is closing all of their 287 stores across the country, including the Eastern Hills Mall location. Also, the mall’s general manager, Russ Fulton, turned down a new Sonic Drive-In which wanted to be located in the mall. The question is: Will Eastern Hills Mall stay alive for generations to come or will it become a dead mall in the near future?
The mall, when it first opened in 1971, was apparently the “Walden Galleria” of its time. It was larger than the Boulevard Mall and had more high-end stores than any other shopping center in Western New York at that time. Since then, stores and restaurants have been downsizing and closing, with other lesser-known establishments moving in, several of them being locally-owned establishments, like the Made-In-America Store and Duff’s Wings.
In a survey of 32 East students, it was asked “Do you believe that the Eastern Hills Mall is dying?” and 24 students said “yes”, 7 students said “no”, and 1 student was undecided. In addition, the question “Do you believe that the Eastern Hills Mall can do anything to secure its future?” found 17 students who replied “yes”, 7 students replied “no”, and 8 students reported as undecided.
According to East, Eastern Hills Mall is dying. That leads to another question: should Eastern Hills Mall make a comeback, to be bigger and better than ever before, or should the mall keep its status quo? If they do close someday, there will be large amount of vacant space to be filled along Transit Road.
