Tag Archives: mall

UPDATE: The Lego Store’s coming to The Galleria

Posted on June 11, 2009 | Leave a comment

legocolours

UPDATE: 7.14.2009 – The Birmingham News has now reported the story and has additional information.

Yes, it’s true – no longer do you have to travel down to Orlando to get your Lego fix. you won’t have to drive all the way to Charlotte either (since they’re getting one too). You’ll just have to go down the road to Hoover and the Riverchase Galleria…

Metro Birmingham is one of twelve U.S. locations announced for the building block’s stand alone stores to be opened in the near future. The store’s site is already up, allowing folks interested in specifics to keep track of the store’s progress. Now, if we can only score some Lego sets based on Birmingham landmarks, similar to the Frank Lloyd Wright series (or a relaunch of the Zack commercials)…

Photo: Lego bricks. Courtesy of The Lego Group.

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Posted in Quirky

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Owner of Century Plaza files for bankruptcy

Posted on April 16, 2009 | Leave a comment

General Growth Properties (GGP) filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection early this morning, as first reported by The New York Times and as announced via press release on GGP’s website. The release states that day to day operations will not be affected by the filing in New York. The New York Times’ blog post also speculates about the company looking to sell off properties to help emerge out of bankruptcy as soon as possible. It is reportedly the largest real estate bankruptcy filing in the nation’s history at $27 billion.

Birmingham’s Century Plaza is on the list of properties included in the filing. GGP also operates the Riverchase Galleria in Hoover, however it was not included in the list of properties since the company only serves as a management agent for one of Alabama’s top shopping destinations.

In February it was announced that the last anchor store at Century Plaza, Sears, had planned to close at the end of May – its already done so.

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Posted in Business

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Century Plaza losing last anchor store

Posted on February 27, 2009 | 5 comments

The Birmingham News is reporting that Sears Holdings, Inc. has announced plans to close the Sears location at Century Plaza this spring, citing “business reasons.”

The department store was the last of the major anchor stores that once called the 34-year old mall home. 

The announcement was made one day after it was reported that Century Plaza’s owner, Chicago’s General Growth Properties, owes more than $1.2 billion in debt and that they are investigating alternative financing solutions. If they cannot find one, the company may be forced to file for bankruptcy protection.

The location is tentatively set to close on May 31, after which you may find some of the 79 employees at the other Birmingham area locations in Fairfield and at The Galleria.

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Posted in Business

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