Macy's Bellevue Center Closes Its Doors

Click here if you would like to see more photos from the past 7 years at Bellevue Hecht's/Macy's.

The Macy's Bellevue Center in Nashville, Tennessee, closed its doors to the public for the final time today. The Bellevue Center mall originally opened in 1990 with two anchors, Dillard's and Castner-Knott's. At one point in the mall's early history, Macy's had planned to come in, and Macy's signs even appeared inside the mall where the store was supposed to go, but those plans fell through.

During the past 18 years, Castner-Knott's, a popular locally-owned-and-operated retail store and chain, was sold to Saks which had acquired local Castner's competitor, Dillard's. Since there was already a Dillard's operating as an anchor store at Bellevue Center (from 1990 to 2007), the Castner's property was sold within a few months to Proffitt's in 1999. Proffitt's lasted a couple of years before it was sold to Hechts.

Hecht's owned the store from 2001 - 2005 when it was announced Federated Department Stores had agreed to acquire May Department Stores in February of 2005 for about $11 billion. For four years after that, the store operated in a strange retail limbo as Hects, although it was owned by Federated, and then as Hechts-Macys in 2008. In September of 2009, the store "officially" became a Macy's Department Store with a grand opening ceremony to announce the occasion.

I have worked at the store part time since it opened, and worked there through it's last official night of March 14, 2009, although it was decided to keep the store open one more day. Last night I said a sad farewell to a mall which had great potential and to a store which I loved during its Caster-Knott's days, and where I remained until its closure.

There is a Yahoo group for former employees of Bellevue Center Hechts/Macy's at BellevueMacys.

Wikipedia gives the store time-line as:
# Macy's (opened as Castner Knott 1990, became Proffitt's 1998, Hecht's 2001, and Macy's 2006; will close 2009)