Century 21 is gearing up for its long-awaited return to New York City next week, one year after the off-price retailer announced its comeback.
Last May, the New York-based retailer said it had teamed up with premium experiences company Legends to introduce a “revitalized shopping experience” in-store at its longtime Cortlandt Street flagship store as well as online.
At the time of the announcement, co-CEO Raymond Gindi said in a statement that he “could not be more excited to bring Century 21 back home” to New York. “Century 21 is, and always will be, a New York City brand…”
The closure of the retailer came in Sept. 2020 when Century 21 filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, which led the company to shutter all 13 of its locations across New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Florida.
So, as Century 21 department store prepares to reopen its flagship at 22 Cortlandt Street on May 16, here is everything you need to know about the opening.
The soon-to-be-reopened Cortlandt Street location will have a smaller footprint than before. Judy Duzich, Century 21’s VP of merchandising, told FN in an interview that the store is now roughly 100,000 square-feet, down from the previous 250,000 square-feet before the closure.
“The store used to be six floors, but we are condensing to the four main floors of the original downtown space,” Duzich said. Men’s, women’s and children’s designer apparel, footwear, outerwear, handbags, accessories and fragrances will all still be part of the mix, but some categories have been phased out. “We will no longer have our home section or large makeup counters, but we do have a great NYC-themed gift area in the store,” Duzich said.
“Shoes and kids are on the lower level, with our core handbags and accessories on the main level,” Duzich noted. “Women’s will be the entire second floor and men’s will live on the third floor.”
What about design updates? According to Duzich, the company had to “reconsider” the floor plan now that there is less space but expect to see more modern design with a much brighter store. “We have a lot more lighting now,” the executive noted. “We also pulled the cash registers out to sit near the exits of each sales floor. Our fitting rooms are larger with full-size mirrors and better lighting. And, we will have an express check-out on the main floor in order to minimize some of the pain points that customers had in the past.”
It will even have a new name: Century 21 Stores will now be known as Century 21 NYC. “We’ve also added more New York-based brands to the store throughout all our divisions, and some NYC-themed giftables like mugs and t-shirts. This is our ode to New York.”
All those avid fans who have been anxiously waiting its return will be making a beeline for the new Century21 on Tuesday, May 16.
