When Federated Department Stores Inc. and the May Department Stores Co. merged in 2005 to become Macy’s Inc. as of June 1, it left a void in Middle America.
JCPenney is looking to fill that void, and is in the midst of a dramatic remodeling effort to update the store’s image, said district manager Tom Kelly in Vancouver.
The oldest department store chain in the country will unveil fully remodeled stores at the Westfield Vancouver Mall and Portland’s Clackamas Town Center and Washington Square Mall on July 13.
In the next five years, JCPenney plans to open 50 new stores a year and remodel 70 to 80 existing stores a year across the country.
Southwest Washington and Portland have proved to be a good market for the store, and the region is currently outperforming the Seattle market, Kelly said.
The Vancouver Mall reports revenues annually of about $24 million, while the Washington Square store exceeds $40 million, according to Assistant Store Manager Deanna Hansen, who moved a month ago from a sales manager position at Washington Square Mall to the Vancouver Mall store.
The company spent almost $3 million remodeling the midsize Vancouver store. The store got new fitting rooms, remodeled restrooms, wider aisles, new optical center, a fully updated salon and large, centrally located customer service stations to make checking out easier and less time consuming.
The larger Washington Square store received a $5 million facelift.
Also new is a 1,500-square-foot Sephora boutique inside the store.
Sephora is one of the most recognized beauty products retailers in the world and it carries more than 200 brands on top of its own label. This is its premier in Southwest Washington.
Both remodeled Portland stores also will feature Sephora boutiques. The only Sephora currently in Oregon is at the Washington Square Mall, according to the company’s website.
“If you’ve watched our company, it has made a dramatic turnaround,” Kelly said. “We’re really not the JCPenney of old. Both the styling and presentation have changed dramatically over the last five years.”
The company has also made a dramatic shift in operations over the last year.
The Vancouver Mall store has increased its employees from 150 to 227 under a “workforce management” program piloted at only eight stores in the country starting last October.
Assistant Store Manager Deanna Hansen said the company has tended to “meet the needs of the associates, but not the needs of the customer” in the past. The company is shifting the balance of full- and part-time employees, and the pilot stores, including Vancouver Mall now have more employees in the 15- to 30-hour range and fewer at 35 hours, which is the benefits-eligible threshold.
This leads to the ability to “increase bodies on the floor to meet customer flow” during peak times but for shorter shift durations, said Hansen, who has been with JCPenney for 23 years. Also, she said, the company used to schedule fewer employers during the day to keep up with customer rushes and schedule more employees at the end of the day to “catch up.”
In addition, the store no longer has merchandise delivered locally. Merchandise now comes through a centralized distribution center in Sumner.
The company’s stock value has also increased in value during that time period.
It has climbed steadily since 2003, starting out below $15 per share and peaking at more than $87 per share in February, according to investor website Morningstar.com.
It started the week of July 2 at $72.65 per share.
The updated store will feature new brands, such as Liz & Co. and a few Kelly could not name yet.
He was quite careful not to refer to the store’s update as an upgrade.
“We’ve been very conscientious about watching price,” Kelly said. “We’re not out to alienate our target market.”
Prior to the remodels, the company conducted region-specific market research in the way of focus groups and customer surveys. The changes introduced with the brand update are a direct result of the research, he said.
“We know where we sit within customer perception,” Kelly said. “JCPenney is 105 years old – the oldest department chain in the world. We’re continuing to grow to meet customer expectations.”
— Additional reporting by Jessica Swanson
