Market Place Shopping Center facts for kids
| Location | Champaign, Illinois, United States |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 40°08′33″N 88°14′35″W / 40.14244°N 88.24307°W |
| Address | 2000 North Neil Street |
| Opening date | 1975 |
| Management | Brookfield Properties Retail Group |
| Owner | Brookfield Properties Retail Group |
| No. of stores and services | 103 |
| No. of anchor tenants | 5 |
| Total retail floor area | 887,071 sq ft (82,412 m2) |
| No. of floors | 1 (2 in Macy's) |
Market Place Shopping Center is a large indoor shopping mall located in Champaign, Illinois, USA. It's a popular place for shopping and fun. The mall has five main "anchor stores" that are usually the biggest shops. These are Dick's Sporting Goods, Field & Stream, JCPenney, Macy's, and Costco Wholesale. This mall is the second largest enclosed shopping center in Central Illinois.
Contents
Mall History
Early Days: Opening in 1975
The Market Place Shopping Center first opened its doors in 1975. When it started, its main anchor stores were Sears, JCPenney, and Bergner's. These big stores helped attract many shoppers to the new mall.
Big Changes and New Stores in the 1990s
In the late 1990s, the mall got a major makeover. It was updated with a cool Tuscany-themed Italian villa style. This big project finished in August 1999. As part of this renovation, a new department store called Famous-Barr was added. This expansion made the mall much larger, reaching about 1,000,000 square feet of shopping space.
More Store Updates in the 2000s
In May 2004, JCPenney returned to the mall as an anchor store. They had left the area a few years before, so it was a big return. In 2006, the Famous-Barr store changed its name to Macy's. This happened because Macy's took over the company that owned Famous-Barr.
Recent Changes and New Additions
Sears Closes and New Stores Arrive
In 2013, it was announced that the Sears store would close in 2014. Sears had been in Champaign for a very long time, since 1928, and was one of the mall's original stores. After Sears closed, its building was taken down. In October 2015, Dick's Sporting Goods and Field & Stream built new stores in that same spot.
More Store Movements and Openings
On January 12, 2018, the Loft store announced it would close. Soon after, on January 24, 2018, it was shared that H&M would be moving into the mall. H&M took over several smaller store spaces to create its new location. These included the former Gymboree store, a previous Banana Republic store, a temporary Christmas shop, and the Forever 21 store. Gymboree closed at the end of January. Forever 21 moved temporarily to another part of the mall before opening a new, permanent store in the H&M area.
Bergner's and Costco Changes
Bergner's closed its doors in August 2018. This was part of a larger closure of all stores owned by the Bon-Ton company. In April 2019, exciting news came that Costco Wholesale would be building a brand new store where Bergner's used to be. To make space for Costco, some other stores like Old Navy and LensCrafters moved to different parts of the mall. The new Costco was expected to open in October 2020.
Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic
In 2020, seven businesses that had been in the mall for many years closed down. This happened because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The stores that closed included Great Steak, Wetzel's Pretzels, Regis Salon, AT&T Store, T-Mobile Store, Villa Italian Kitchen, and Mango Mango Creamery. This was the largest number of stores to close at once in the mall since 2017.
Bus Lines
You can reach Market Place Shopping Center using several bus lines:
- 100 Yellow to Savoy Walmart, 1st and Gregory, Illinois Terminal, Gerty and Griffith
- 1 Yellow to Savoy Walmart
- 2 Red to Lincoln Square
- 20 Red to Lincoln Square
Stores Coming Soon
There are no new stores announced at the moment.
