Two longtime fixtures at Northgate Mall in Hixson, Victoria's Secret and PINK stores, won't reopen after closing earlier this year due to the coronavirus outbreak, according to the retailer.
A spokeswoman for the retailer's two stores at Hamilton Place mall, which have reopened, said the Northgate units will stay closed.
At the stores, black plastic was put over the inside of the storefront windows. The store names were either removed or covered up and it looks as if the merchandise was taken away.
Also at Northgate, the Children's Place store is empty and Vitamin World appears closed. In addition, the mall's Justice store is on a closings list obtained by USA Today of Ascena Retail Group units. Ascena, parent of Justice, Ann Taylor, Loft, Lane Bryant and Catherines, filed Thursday for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and announced plans to close many of its stores nationally.
But the Zales jewelry store, which was closed for weeks, reopened Friday at Northgate. A sign at Kay Jewelers, which also closed during the coronavirus outbreak, says it plans to reopen Monday.
Stacey Keating, senior director of public relations and corporate communications for mall owner CBL Properties, said its leasing team is already working to find replacement tenants for Victoria's Secret and PINK.
She said the mall owner was unable to provide a mid-year, per-property occupancy rate for the center.
Many retailers and mall companies, such as Chattanooga-based CBL, are struggling to manage their businesses during the coronavirus outbreak.
CBL, which also owns Hamilton Place mall and operates a portfolio of 108 properties nationally, has elected to skip making interest payments on two of its loans to lenders and is in talks with them about how to move ahead.
Nick Shields, senior analyst for investment research firm Third Bridge, said that a lot of the troubles seen in the mall and retail landscape nationally in recent months aren't completely new. But the coronavirus pandemic sped up the process, he said.
"What has happened is we've got five years of store closures in malls in the five months since the pandemic hit in March," he said. "It has sped up that time frame."
Shields said that a number of so-called 'B' and 'C' malls aren't going to survive as they are now.
"They went into the pandemic already struggling," he said, with some of them having low occupancy rates.
At Northgate, the former vacant JCPenney store was earlier purchased by Chattanooga developer Bassam Issa and John Woods, the chief executive officer at asset manager Southport Capital and a Chattanooga Lookouts owner. They also agreed to purchase the former Sears site and have been working on a deal to sell those properties to the Hamilton County school board.
The board is eyeing letters of intent to buy the Sears parcel for $6.5 million and the Penney tract for $2.4 million.
A replacement for the Chattanooga School for the Liberal Arts could go at the Sears site with the school potentially expanded to a K-12 program. The Penney's store could become the future home of a combined Alpine Crest/DuPont/Rivermont elementary school, as recommended in "Phase One" of a schools facilities plan.
Keating said it's too early in the process to say what the mall may look like if the school board moves forward.
Contact Mike Pare at mpare@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @MikePareTFP.