The downfall of iconic department store The Bay is throwing the future of downtown Vancouver’s retail sector further into question.
The retailer is expected to begin liquidating its 80 stores soon, after entering creditor protection earlier this month.
The company has said it expects to complete the liquidation by mid-June, at which point it will shut stores down.
The closure of the retailer’s flagship Robson and Granville store, on the heels of Nordstrom’s downtown Vancouver closure in 2023, will leave the city’s core with hundreds of thousands of square feet of empty retail space.
“The vacancies will eventually get dealt with, they will be redeveloped. There is a rumoured tenancy for the old Nordstrom building, but obviously it’s a loss for the core and the adjacent businesses down there,” retail analyst David Ian Gray with Dig360 Consulting said.
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“(It has been) a really tough five years in retail, really challenging. It’s Darwinian, so there’s lots of players that are doing better than ever and lots of others falling by the wayside — Hudson’s Bay Company (is) falling by the wayside.”
Meanwhile, a proposal for a major development at 800 Granville St., which would have included retail space, was cancelled last year. No revised plan for the site has been submitted at this point.
Vancouver City Councillor Mike Klassen said he wasn’t aware of any conversations with The Bay.
But he said he had heard some “interesting proposals” from parties with interest in the heritage building it occupies.
Klassen admitted the city is facing difficult economic headwinds, given the simmering trade war with the United States, but said he remains bullish on the future of downtown.
Council is currently working on a new plan for the Granville Entertainment District, he said, and the city has launched a new Business and Economy Office to hear directly from stakeholders.
“The Granville Entertainment District and Granville Street as a whole is really the centre of our city in many ways,” Klassen said.
“So we have to be thinking really strategically about how we are going to be able to develop the downtown core.”
New hotels have also been proposed downtown, and the coming 2026 FIFA World Cup is expected to inject energy into the city.
“I think what we’re experiencing right now is part of the life cycle of this area,” he said.
“The future is still bright.”
It’s not clear how the next steps in the company’s future will play out. The retailer is still waiting to get court permission to start liquidating all of its stores, though Hudson’s Bay says it could remove some from the fire sale if it secures enough financing.
— with a file from the Canadian Press
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