Northgate Mall is an enclosed

shopping mall A shopping mall (or simply mall) is a North American term for a large indoor shopping center, usually anchored by department stores. The term "mall" originally meant a pedestrian promenade with shops along it (that is, the term was used to refe ...

Northgate, Ohio Northgate is a census-designated place (CDP) in Hamilton County, Ohio, United States. The population was 7,377 at the 2010 census. Northgate Mall serves as a shopping hub for the west side of Cincinnati. Geography Northgate is located at (39. ...

. Built in 1972, the mall currently has only one vacant anchor store out of the two anchor stores that were once

Sears Sears, Roebuck and Co. ( ), commonly known as Sears, is an American chain of department stores founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosenwald, with what began a ...

and

Macy's Macy's (originally R. H. Macy & Co.) is an American chain of high-end department stores founded in 1858 by Rowland Hussey Macy. It became a division of the Cincinnati-based Federated Department Stores in 1994, through which it is affiliated wi ...

History

Construction on the mall began in 1970, on the site of a former

airport An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities, mostly for commercial air transport. Airports usually consists of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surface ...

. It opened on September 10, 1972, anchored by

McAlpin's McAlpin's was a Cincinnati-based department store founded in 1852 as Ellis, McAlpin & Co. McAlpin's opened their landmark downtown location on Fourth Street in 1880. In 1954, McAlpin's became the first Cincinnati department store to open a suburba ...

and Pogue's. The mall also included a

Kroger The Kroger Company, or simply Kroger, is an American retail company that operates (either directly or through its subsidiaries) supermarkets and multi-department stores throughout the United States. Founded by Bernard Kroger in 1883 in Cincin ...

supermarket. Pogue's became

L. S. Ayres L. S. Ayres and Company was a department store based in Indianapolis, Indiana, and founded in 1872 by Lyman S. Ayres. Over the years its Indianapolis flagship store, which opened in 1905 and was later enlarged, became known for its women's fas ...

in 1984, and then

J. C. Penney Penney OpCo LLC, doing business as JCPenney and often abbreviated JCP, is a midscale American department store chain operating 667 stores across 49 U.S. states and Puerto Rico. Departments inside JCPenney stores include Mens, Womens, Boys, Girl ...

in 1988. Lazarus was added as a fourth anchor in 1993 and became Lazarus-Macy's in 2003 and then

in 2005.

Dillard's Dillard's, Inc. is an upscale American department store chain with approximately 282 stores in 29 states and headquartered in Little Rock, Arkansas. Currently, the largest number of stores are located in Texas with 57 and Florida with 42. The ...

acquired McAlpin's in 1999, and that anchor store closed in 2009. JCPenney closed their anchor store in 2006 and moved to a new location at Stone Creek Towne Center, just north of the mall property. The Pogue's/JCPenney anchor store was demolished in 2007 for construction of a 14-screen Rave multiplex

movie theater A movie theater (American English), cinema (British English), or cinema hall ( Indian English), also known as a movie house, picture house, the movies, the pictures, picture theater, the silver screen, the big screen, or simply theater is a ...

, but construction on the theater never began, after the mall's then-owners defaulted on a $74 million loan. The Xscape 14 Theaters at Northgate Mall opened in lieu of the Rave multiplex in January of 2015 and is still operational to date (JAN 2023). In 2012, the mall was sold to Tabani Group. The vacant Dillard's anchor store was subdivided into four big-box stores in 2013 - DSW,

Marshalls Marshalls is an American chain of off-price department stores owned by TJX Companies. Marshalls has over 1,000 American stores, including larger stores named Marshalls Mega Store, covering 42 states and Puerto Rico, and 61 stores in Canada. Mar ...

Michaels Michaels Stores, Inc., more commonly known as Michaels, is a privately held chain of 1,252 American and Canadian arts and crafts stores, as of January 2021. It is one of North America's largest providers of arts, crafts, framing, floral and wall ...

, and

Ulta Ulta Beauty, Inc., formerly known as Ulta Salon, Cosmetics & Fragrance Inc. and before 2000 as Ulta3, is an American chain of beauty stores headquartered in Bolingbrook, Illinois. Ulta Beauty carries both high-end and low-end cosmetics, fragra ...

. A space briefly occupied by Famous Labels in 2010 became

Burlington Coat Factory Burlington, formerly known as Burlington Coat Factory, is an American national off-price department store retailer, and a division of Burlington Coat Factory Warehouse Corporation with more than 1,000 stores in 40 states and Puerto Rico, with it ...

in 2013. In 2014, an

H. H. Gregg H. H. Gregg, Inc. (stylized as hhgregg or HHgregg on their website) is an American online retailer and former retail chain of consumer electronics and home appliances in the Midwest, Northeast, and Southeast United States, that operated stores in ...

store was added in a new structure on the north side of the old Dillard's structure. That store closed in 2017.

Ashley Furniture Ashley Furniture Industries, Inc. is an American home furnishings manufacturer and retailer, headquartered in Arcadia, Wisconsin. The company is owned by father and son team Ron and Todd Wanek. Ashley Furniture manufactures and distributes home ...

also opened in 2014 (closed in summer 2020). In 2015, the site of the demolished JCPenney anchor was filled when an Xscape theater was built. The

anchor store closed in November 2018, as part of a plan to close 46 stores nationwide, leaving

Macy’s Macy's (originally R. H. Macy & Co.) is an American chain of high-end department stores founded in 1858 by Rowland Hussey Macy. It became a division of the Cincinnati-based Federated Department Stores in 1994, through which it is affiliated wi ...

as the sole remaining anchor. In December 2018, the local township trustees completed a study to investigate the feasibility of creating a mixed-used facility on the mall property, to also include residential development. On December 26, 2019, an incident where over a hundred teens stormed the mall at night, believed to be a result of a social media post gathering the youths to come to the mall at a certain time, occurred and caused a panic in both shoppers and store employees and resulted in a massive police response and evacuation of the mall. No injuries were reported and several arrests were made. Coincidentally, this incident happened on the fourth anniversary of a similar and much worse incident at a mall called St. Matthews in Louisville, Kentucky, where up to 2,000 teens stormed the mall on December 26, 2015. In January 2020,

announced that they would close in March 2020 as part of a plan to close 125 stores nationwide. This left the mall with no traditional anchor stores. Shortly after Macy’s announced its store closure, township officials announced plans to convert the mall into an outdoor lifestyle center similar to nearby centers in Cincinnati like Rookwood Commons and Pavilion in Norwood or Liberty Center in neighboring Butler County. This project would not start for at least a couple years as funding and official plans and contractors are needed and therefore, no timeframe was revealed on the plan as of now. In November 2021, online auction site BidSoFlo.com leased the former Macy's anchor store and is still currently a tenant there to date (JAN 2023). As of 2022, the Property Management office for Northgate Mall had a complete turnover of all its staff in order to achieve newfound success for the retail center overall. The Property Management office moved their office from a little known 2nd floor space of the mall to the main floor of the mall itself in hopes to make their office more accessible to the public and their tenants. Their new office is located at the West End of the mall near the vacant former Sears anchor store (JAN 2023).

References

External links

Official website
{{Shopping malls in Ohio Shopping malls in Hamilton County, Ohio Shopping malls established in 1972