The Londonderry Shopping Centre in Edmonton is adding new retailers and amenities to serve the local community. And the mall’s Hudson’s Bay store, which was supposed to shut in August of this year, will now be staying open in a smaller footprint.
Landlord Cushman & Wakefield says that sales numbers at Londonderry have surpassed those of 2019 before the pandemic, both for the mall’s food court as well as for the centre as a whole. Recently, a 38,000 square foot No Frills grocery store opened at Londonderry, replacing a Save-on-Foods that shut several months ago. The new grocery store is said to already be very busy.
Other new tenants at Londonderry include Service Canada, which next year will be opening a 10,000 square foot facility at Londonderry including a passport office. It will serve the local community and be a “win” for the mall according to landlord Cushman and Wakefield. The goal of adding the new passport office is to continue diversifying Londonderry’s retail offerings by adding more service based providers to drive regular traffic.
The mall’s Shoppers Drug Mart store recently expanded its offerings to include a new BeautyBOUTIQUE component, offering a range of cosmetics and fragrance brands at Londonderry. The Shoppers Drug Mart store at Londonderry spans about 17,000 square feet on the main floor in a space adjacent to No Frills.
And the biggest announcement as of late is the retention of the Hudson’s Bay department store at Londonderry, albeit in a smaller footprint than what has operated for decades in the mall. Hudson’s Bay is downsizing its store from about 118,000 square feet over two floors to about 60,000 square feet on one level, which will feature outlet pricing. The store downsizing will be completed by the beginning of September according to the landlord.
The Hudson’s Bay store will occupy the first level of the shopping centre, creating an opportunity upstairs for the landlord to re-set the mall’s tenant mix with multiple leasing opportunities. New tenants could include retail and services depending on what’s conceptualized and signed.
In 2014, it was announced that Londonderry would see an investment of more than $130 million to overhaul the centre, including major interior alterations and exterior elements. With that, many new retailers were added to Londonderry including anchor La Maison Simons. In 2017, the mall’s overhaul was revealed to the public with Simons opening its beautiful two-level store in August of that year.
New tenants have continued to be added, including in the fall of 2019 when H&M opened a large store in the mall near Simons. Londonderry is also home to a substantial number of independent retailers operated by local entrepreneurs.
Londonderry opened in 1972. At the time, it was the largest mall in Canada west of Toronto, as well as the only two-level mall in Western Canada. Today, the 780,000 square foot centre features about 150 retailers with anchors including Hudson’s Bay, La Maison Simons, No Frills, Winners, Shoppers Drug Mart, Dollarama, Fabricland, and Fit 4 Less.
When Londonderry originally opened, its three department store anchors included Hudson’s Bay, Eaton’s, and Woolco. The No Frills store now occupies part of the former Eaton’s space on the main floor with Fit 4 Less, while Fabricland, Dollarama and the food court are located on the second level of the former Eaton’s. Simons is located in the part of the mall that had been Woolco — Army and Navy occupied the space after that and it shut in 2016.
