Downtown Salt Lake City was flooded with more bad economic news Wednesday, two days before the traditional busiest shopping day of the year.
Crossroads Plaza managers were dealing with speculation that The Gap, Baby Gap and Gap Kids would be pulling out after the Christmas shopping season.
But while mall managers remained hopeful that the three Gap stores might stay, some employees at the Crossroads Plaza Gap were certain their store was closing.
"Dec. 26 is our last day," one Gap employee said. "That's Gap Kids, Baby Gap and us, we're all leaving."
Barry A. Smith, Crossroads Plaza general manager, confirmed Wednesday that the leases for The Gap, Baby Gap and Gap Kids expire on Dec. 31 and haven't been renewed.
Despite rumors that the company intends to pull out of the downtown mall, Smith said Crossroads hasn't given up hope.
"We're happy to work with them on lease negotiations," he said. "We're talking to them and have offers out to them. They say they're considering it. Our last conversation was a few days ago."
Smith noted that The Gap has been a part of Crossroads for nearly a decade. He said at a press conference on Tuesday that the apparel retailer was one of several mall vendors reporting improved sales receipts for the year.
At City Hall, Salt Lake City Community and Economic Development director Alison Weyher was similarly hopeful that Crossroads Plaza owners and managers could convince The Gap to stay.
"What I heard is that their lease expires Dec. 31 and that they are indeed talking with the new mall owners," she said. "Everyone's working hard to get the lease renewed, and at this point no one knows what's going to happen yet."
In July, The Gap Inc., which owns The Gap, Banana Republic and Old Navy, shut down its Main Street Old Navy store for lack of business. That Old Navy, which was a half-block from the Crossroads Plaza Gap, had been in business for less than three years, and The Gap Inc. is still paying off a 10-year lease with the building's owner.
A pair of Gap Inc. spokeswomen, Kim Terry and Debbie Eliades, said Wednesday they couldn't confirm if the Crossroads store was set to close because they couldn't reach their real-estate division since many employees had left early for the Thanksgiving holiday.
Crossroads Plaza has seen several stores close after The Gateway mixed-use development opened in 2001. Many of those stores, including Express and The Limited, left Crossroads after opening up shops at The Gateway, a sprawling development just four blocks west of Main Street downtown.
Like those stores, The Gap, Baby Gap and Gap Kids are all open at The Gateway.
Last month, Nordstrom, Crossroads' anchor tenant, along with The Boyer Co., which owns The Gateway, begged the City Council to change zoning to allow the Seattle-based retailer to move from Crossroads to The Gateway. However, council members balked at the zoning change, saying they didn't want to split the city's major shopping centers between Main Street and The Gateway.
Nordstrom has repeatedly said it will leave Crossroads when its lease expires in August 2005. However, the LDS Church recently purchased Crossroads Plaza and together with the neighboring ZCMI Center — also on Main Street — plans a $500 million renovation of the two malls. Consultants hired to conduct the renovation have been talking with Nordstrom and hope to convince it to stay.
The Gap's exit, however, might be a death knell to any Nordstrom negotiations because Nordstrom has already complained about the lack of quality complementary retailers at Crossroads Plaza.
E-mail: bsnyder@desnews.com; jnii@desnews.com