Macy’s expects to reopen all of its 775 stores within 8 weeks

Plan begins with 68 stores on Monday

Macy’s, one of the biggest department store chains in the United States, announced an ambitious plan Thursday to reopen all of its 775 locations, including Bloomingdales and Bluemercury, in the next six to eight weeks, the latest sign of how eager the nation’s largest retailers are to return to business.

The reopening plan will start Monday with 68 stores in Georgia, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas. Macy’s will reopen another 50 locations on May 11. Macy’s temporarily closed its stores March 18 because of the coronavirus pandemic, causing the majority of its sales to disappear.

Macy’s expects that its reopened stores will only bring in about 15% to 20% of their typical business at first and “slowly build” from there, the company’s chief executive, Jeff Gennette, said

during a presentation. He acknowledged that it was an open question as to whether shoppers would return.

“We’ll see how they respond, and based on that, we’ll be a lot smarter,” he said. “So I’m going to know a lot more by Tuesday of next week.”

The presentation from

Macy’s illustrated what a pandemic- era shopping experience might look like. There will be new protocols for fitting rooms and beauty counters, associates will wear company-issued cloth masks and sometimes gloves, hand sanitizer stations will be placed by elevators and escalators, and plexiglass barriers will be installed at cash registers. Stores will be filled with signs reminding customers to maintain 6 feet from each other.

Only a limited number of fitting rooms will be open and items that have been tried on will not be returned to the sales floor for at least 24 hours.

Macy’s beauty employees will offer “no touch consultations” and suspend any “spa-like services.” Cards sprayed with fragrances will only be given out to customers at their request. Ear- piercing, bra- fitting and alteration services will be temporarily suspended. Dress shirts will not be available to try on. And customers will need to use hand sanitizer before they try on jewelry or watches.

Macy’s made its announcement the same week that documents from Simon Property Group, the country’s biggest mall operator, outlined plans to reopen 49 shopping centers across 10 states between Friday and Monday. Macy’s said that roughly a quarter of the stores it planned to reopen Monday were in Simon Property malls.