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MIAMI BEACH - Macy's is on a mission here.
Macy's Florida reopened its South Beach store at 1675 Meridian Avenue Saturday with great fanfare after a major seven-figure renovation and remerchandising in concurrence with its researched demographics. The store had been closed since March.
To hear Robert Unger, senior vice president of store design and visual presentation, describe the project's physical changes and modern retail strategies is exciting for a community that relies on one department store, and marks a definite departure from the division's 61 locations throughout Florida and Puerto Rico.
"The South Beach store is a unique entity. There is no prototype," he said of the 1953 freestanding building between Lincoln Road and the Miami Beach Convention Center that initially housed Burdines until Macy's folded the Florida chain into its fleet. "Our goal was to restore it back to the original, Fifties modern intent."
The layout alone is progressive, as Unger reports it's the company's smallest, two-story branch in Florida with approximately 90,000 square feet of selling space. The interior was gutted, save the elevator and expensive Sheetrock...