Walt Whitman Shops in Huntington Station in talks to 'diversify' retail, lifestyle experience

Walt Whitman Shops, which was home to the last Saks Fifth Avenue store on Long Island, is in talks to “diversify the retail and lifestyle experience” at the Huntington Station mall, the property's landlord said.

The Saks Fifth Avenue store at 230 Walt Whitman Rd. closed in May after the retailer's troubled parent company expanded its list of store shutdowns after a bankruptcy filing. 

“Saks Fifth Avenue at Walt Whitman Shops has closed as part of their bankruptcy restructuring, and we appreciate the role the brand has played at the center,” Indianapolis-based Simon Property Group, which owns Walt Whitman Shops, told Newsday in an emailed statement.

The landlord said July 1 that it is “actively engaged in discussions with a number of exciting new concepts that will further enhance and diversify the retail and lifestyle experience at Walt Whitman Shops.” Additional details will be released soon, Simon said.

The Town of Huntington's planning department is unaware of any existing applications or proposals to fill the space, Huntington Town spokeswoman Christine Geed said Tuesday. 

Saks' closing leaves Walt Whitman Shops, which leans high-end, with two large vacancies created by the exits of upscale department stores, including Lord & Taylor.

The Lord & Taylor store, which opened in the mall in 1998 at 120,000 square feet, closed in 2020 after the luxury retailer filed for bankruptcy.

The shuttered Saks Fifth Avenue store occupied nearly 100,000 square feet.

The mall's two remaining department stores and largest tenants are Macy's and Bloomingdale's.

"Department stores in general have been in decline for a long time in the U.S.," as shoppers prefer to buy directly from brands rather than multi-brand department stores, said David Swartz, consumer equity analyst at Morningstar Research Services LLC, a financial services firm in Chicago.

While high-end malls perform well, struggling properties are being revamped with open-air layouts or diversified tenant lineups that lean more upscale, Newsday previously reported.

Large former department store spaces on Long Island can also remain vacant for years, leaving questions about what type of retailers can replace them, said Jared Koeck, associate director of market analytics at CoStar Group, an Arlington, Virginia-based provider of commercial real estate information.

Because of their large size, “it can be more difficult or time-consuming to find a suitable tenant to backfill the space," he said.

Still, Long Island's mall vacancy rate as of the second quarter was 6.3%, below the national average of 8.5%, Koeck said.

There are also alternative options for filling vacant spaces at malls, beyond adding retailers, Koeck said.

In Stamford, Connecticut, for example, a former Saks OFF 5TH, which is an off-price store, was transformed into a pickleball facility in 2023, he said. 

At Samanea New York in Westbury, the property's owner continues pushing to transform the mall into a "lifestyle destination" with more tenants selling experiences than clothes.

After undergoing a $30 million revamp in 2021 designed to revitalize the struggling site, the property's occupancy rate has risen to 76%, as tenants offering laser tag, rock climbing, miniature golf, arts and crafts, indoor pickleball courts and other activities have opened in the past few years.

Saks Global, the parent company of Saks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman, announced on June 26 it had rebranded as Exemplar Luxury Group after emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy with less debt and a smaller retail footprint.

The parent company, under the new ownership, cut its debt by 75% and the company has "the liquidity necessary to support long-term growth and profitability,” according to a statement from the company.

Before Saks Global filed for bankruptcy protection in January, there were 33 Saks stores and 36 Neiman Marcus stores, a Bergdorf Goodman store on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan and roughly 70 off-price Saks Off 5TH stores, according to the company.

There are now 49 stores remaining, six of which are in New York: two Neiman Marcus locations in White Plains and in the Roosevelt Field mall in Uniondale on Long Island; a Saks Fifth Avenue flagship store and a Bergdorf Goodman in Manhattan; and two Saks OFF 5TH stores in Westbury Plaza in Uniondale and Woodbury commons in Central Valley, upstate New York, an Exemplar spokeswoman said.

Newsday's Tory N. Parrish and The Associated Press contributed to this story.