BRIDGEHAMPTON — Attention Kmart shoppers: It's the end of an era. Kmart, a longtime retail chain known for its “blue light deals” and carrying everything under the sun at a discount, is set to close its last full-size location in the United States next month.
The lone surviving Kmart, located at 2044 Montauk Highway in Bridgehampton Commons, will close its doors soon, a store employee told Patch, adding that store closing discounts of up to 40 percent are available.
The retail space, owned by Kimco Realty Corp., will definitely close in October, Jennifer Maisch, the company's vice president of marketing and corporate communications, confirmed to Patch.
For years, Tony Hamptonites have headed to Kmart for affordable everyday essentials — electronics, toys, clothing, bedding, furniture and home decor — that couldn't be found anywhere else without a trek of up to an hour to Riverhead ( and that's without summer traffic).
But Kmart devotees have long worried that the end was near: Kmart's parent company, Tranformco, announced in 2019 that the Bohemia store would close in 2020. That store, located at 5151 Sunrise Highway, was among 96 Sears and Kmart stores that closed in February 2020.
Transformco did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Patch about the closing of the Bridgehampton store.
“Since purchasing substantially all of the assets of Sears Holdings Corporation in February 2019, Transformco has faced a challenging retail environment and other challenges,” the company wrote in a statement in 2019. “We are working hard to position Transformco for success by focusing to Our competitive advantages and pruning operations that have been challenged by increased competition and other factors, to support these initiatives, our owners (along with a third-party investor) recently provided the company with approximately $250 million in new capital.
As a result, the company made the “difficult but necessary” decision in 2019 to close operations.
After the Bohemia store closed, only one Kmart remained on Long Island, in Bridgehampton. A Farmingville Kmart closed in 2019.
After the Bridgehampton store closes, the only store left will be a smaller location in Miami.
According to Transformco, Kmart was born when Sebastian Spering Kresge opened a five-dime store in downtown Detroit. Under the leadership of Harry B. Cunningham, who became Kresge's president in 1959, the first Kmart discount department store opened in 1962 in Garden City, Michigan. 17 additional Kmart stores opened that year, driving corporate sales of more than $483 million, Transformco said.
“In 1977, nearly 95 percent of SS Kresge Company's sales came from Kmart stores. To reflect this dramatic impact, the company officially changed its name to Kmart Corporation. Ten years later, Kmart sold the remaining stores Kresge to fully focus on discount merchandising,” Transformco said.
“Blue-light deals”, discounts announced in stores with blue lights that were only available for 15 minutes, were the stuff of memories for generations of families who shopped at the store.
Although by 2000, there were 2,200 Kmart, Big Kmart, and Super Kmart stores throughout the United States, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Guam, by 2002, they were facing competition in the form of other discount chains, Kmart declared bankruptcy. Brittanica Money said.
But the business moved forward, closing some stores but eventually emerging from Chapter 11, Transformco said.
Kmart still has a presence in the US Virgin Islands, with three stores, and in Australia, New Zealand and other overseas locations.
The Bridgehampton location, which occupied the site of the former Caldor, has had its share of Hamptons moments.
Justin Bieber was spotted at Bridgehampton Commons in 2016 — along with his three tour buses and a few SUVs. Bieber had been on tour in Baltimore and had a show Saturday in New Jersey, so his visit was a quick trip to the Hamptons.
But the star did have time to pop into the iconic Kmart, where an employee said: “Friday afternoon, Justin bought a panama hat here.”
