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Pedestrians walk past the Neiman Marcus department store in downtown Dallas on Monday. The retailer\u2019s parent company, Saks Global,\u00a0which acquired Neiman Marcus at the end of 2024, said the site will close at the end of September.<\/p>\n
Angela Piazza\/The Dallas Morning News<\/p>\n
Neiman\u00a0Marcus <\/a>will close its downtown Dallas department store, ending months of speculation and delivering another blow to the central business district landscape.<\/p>\n The iconic store is set to shutter at the end of September as the company turns its focus on the\u00a0NorthPark Center amid a bankruptcy process with Saks Global, which acquired Neiman Marcus at the end of 2024. The closure will close the chapter on a multidecade run for the retailer that had acted as a fashion beacon for the region.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is not an easy decision, but it is a final decision,\u201d said\u00a0Geoffroy van Raemdonck, CEO of Saks Global. \u201cThe rationale is really we\u2019ve looked at multiple criteria, but it\u2019s mostly the criteria of what are the customer preferences and where is demand, and what we see is that there\u2019s a shift in the retail map in Dallas.”<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Related: What to know about Neiman Marcus closing downtown Dallas store<\/a><\/p>\n The downtown Dallas store was a flagship property for Dallas-founded and headquartered\u00a0Neiman Marcus until the chain was purchased by upscale competitor Saks Global in 2024. For more than a century, the building was the epicenter of luxury retail in North Texas and welcomed some of the world\u2019s biggest names in fashion such as Christian Dior, Sophia Loren and Gloria Vanderbilt.<\/p>\n With the change,\u00a0Neiman Marcus plans to infuse elements of the downtown store and its history into the NorthPark site, according to the company. This includes reimagining the Neiman Marcus Cafe into The Zodiac Room and celebrating other pieces of its history.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is not an easy decision, but it is a final decision,\u201d Geoffroy van Raemdonck, CEO of Saks Global, said of the store\u2019s closing.<\/p>\n Angela Piazza\/The Dallas Morning News<\/p>\n The downtown store\u202fwas first set to close\u202fat the end of March in 2025<\/a> after weeks of back and forth between city and business official<\/a>s and the company\u202famid a lease dispute. Yet an\u202f11th-hour announcement\u202fstaved off the shuttering<\/a> with the site set to be kept open through the holiday shopping at the end of last year \u2014 and then the lifeline was extended into 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n The\u00a0NorthPark store does more than 10 times the sales of the downtown site, van Raemdonck said. And sales, despite the attention the store attracted last year, declined in 2025.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is a store that is not profitable, and so I think that (the) customer has decided where she or he wants to access the\u00a0Neiman Marcus brand,\u201d van Raemdonck said.<\/p>\n The change came as\u00a0Saks Global is navigating a bankruptcy process <\/a>after filing Chapter 11 in January amid challenges with shifting tastes among consumers, mounting debt and ongoing headwinds in the retail industry.\u202fWith the filing, van Raemdonck, who had led the company before the merger, took over as CEO.<\/p>\n The company, while looking to emerge from bankruptcy this month, already has made moves to streamline the company with closures of stores across the country, including off-price versions amid other efforts with effects on its corporate workforce and distribution centers, van\u00a0Raemdonck said.<\/p>\n What happens next with the store, which has multiple leaseholders, isn\u2019t clear for now.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n \u201cWe think it\u2019s a beautiful building, and we will work with everyone to make sure that it finds the right\u201d situation, van Raemdonck said.<\/p>\n Van\u00a0Raemdonck said he had met with the mayor, Eric Johnson, and his team in what was \u00a0a \u201cconstructive\u201d and \u201copen-minded\u201d discussion. At the time of the lifeline last year in March, there were thoughts about how the site could be reimagined, including an event center and an incubator.<\/p>\n \u201cAt the end of the day, we are a retail company that went through a financial restructuring to rebuild itself,\u201d van\u00a0Raemdonck said. \u201cFor me, it\u2019s really important that we focus on the core of our business.\u201d<\/p>\n The company is in the process of confirming a long-term plan for the bridal salon but intends to service brides out of the NorthPark store with the closure of the downtown store.<\/p>\n The exit of Neiman Marcus, which is set for Sept. 30, comes at an already difficult time for the the city\u2019s downtown as key names in the community move on from the core.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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