After 33 years in business in Toledo, Elder-Beerman’s presence here and elsewhere will cease to exist.
The Dayton-based retailer has been a fixture in the Toledo trade area since 1985 when it entered the market by purchasing three stores that originally began as department stores of the former Lasalle & Koch Co., and for a brief time operated under the Macy’s banner.
Macy’s had acquired Toledo-based Lasalle’s, which for a brief time operated as a Macy’s subsidiary. But in 1982 the Lasalle stores were converted to Macy’s stores.
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In 1984 Macy’s decided to eliminate its Toledo footprint altogether by selling its three area properties to Elder-Beerman. Among the three was the 154,000-square-foot store at 3301 Secor Rd., which is the only one of the three that has remained open.
As part of the three-store transaction, Elder-Beerman also acquired the Macy’s (Lasalle’s) at the former Woodville Mall on Williston Road in Northwood, and the Macy’s in Toledo’s former North Towne Square mall on Alexis Road.
Elder-Beerman later closed the North Towne Square store in 1997 as part of a restructuring following a downsizing move that ended two years in Chapter 11 bankruptcy. After the retailer exited bankruptcy, it became a public company and operated independently until 2003 when it was acquired by its current owner, Milwaukee-based Bon-Ton Stores, which also is now in bankruptcy.
North Towne Square mall never found a new occupant for the vacant Elder-Beerman space and the mall — which opened in 1980 to great fanfare — was closed in 2005 and later demolished.
Elder-Beerman kept its Woodville Mall store open until 2009. At the time the store closed, the the mall itself was in need of repairs and it continued to lose tenants.
The mall later closed in December, 2011, and eventually was mostly demolished in 2014. The Elder-Beerman store currently is in remediation for hazardous material and then will be demolished.
Ironically, Macy’s, which paved the way for Elder-Beerman to come to Toledo by selling its stores and leaving the market, returned to Toledo in 2005 by acquiring Marshall Field’s, which had a store at Franklin Park Mall. Macy’s remains at Franklin Park while Elder-Beerman soon will leave Toledo and go out of existence altogether.
Contact Jon Chavez at jchavez@theblade.com or 419-724-6128.
First Published April 18, 2018, 1:34 a.m.
