Santa Monica’s Disney Store, located in the Santa Monica Place mall, will close as part of a 60-store contraction announced by the House of Mouse this month.
“While consumer behavior has shifted toward online shopping, the global pandemic has changed what consumers expect from a retailer,” said Stephanie Young, president, Consumer Products Games and Publishing.
“Over the past few years, we’ve been focused on meeting consumers where they are already spending their time, such as the expansion of Disney store shop-in-shops around the world. We now plan to create a more flexible, interconnected ecommerce experience that gives consumers easy access to unique, high-quality products across all our franchises.”
Young said Disney will work on integrating it’s online sales platform (Shopdisney.com) with the Disney Parks apps and social media platforms.
The branded store closures do not impact sales through third party locations or the company’s smaller “store-in-store” concepts that curate Disney products inside some Target locations.
The store will close on March 23.
Disney is the second high-profile tenant to shutter in the mall this year following the closure of Bloomingdale’s. Sonoma Wine Garden and Starbucks also recently announced closures of their Santa Monica Place locations.
Supermodel Tyra Banks took over and rebranded the coffee shop on the Mall’s ground floor to SMIZE Cream, an ice cream story featuring limited edition flavors with the supermodel's likeness on the branding. The store is her second venture in the Mall but the first to open. Banks has previously announced her ModelLand concept but the facility has yet to open.
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