Woodbridge Center how it’s looking today.

 I ventured over to nearby Woodbridge Center mall with less than a week till Christmas. Currently the mall is doing okay but slowly dying but not dramatically yet. It depends if Macy’s and JC Penny remain after this year is over. The only store which was doing very well was Boscov’s since they opened in what was Fortunoff and Hahne’s a decade ago. The rest of the mall has half stores open and a lot closed in the wings where Lord and Taylor and Sears once was not too long ago before the pandemic happened in 2020

A history of the mall. 

In March of 1971, Woodbridge Center opened with the first A&S in the garden state. Ohrbach’s and Stern’s would follow. In 1978, the mall recieved its expansion and adding two more anchors which was Hahne’s in 1979 and JC Penny in the early 80’s after moving from nearby Menlo Park mall. The first two anchor changes happened from the mid to late 80’s as Ohrbach’s went out of business and Steinbach came in 1987 and Hahne’s was dropped by May dept stores most converted to Lord and Taylor but Woodbridge converted to Fortunoff. The 90’s was still thriving till 2 more anchors left the mall which was A&S in 1995 after Macy’s dropped the A&S branding. But this store did not convert to that instead was sold to Sears and Steinbach closed and opened as Lord and Taylor in 1996. The new millennium was still good but with more online shopping who was gonna venture to the malls??!! In 2003 Gaylan’s would enter as the malls 6th anchor but a junior one and quickly converted  to Dick’s sporting goods  The late 2000’s lost another anchor as Fortunoff would go out of business. 2013 Boscov’s would open then things went downhill with the mall. Lord and Taylor would go out of business closing its store on Christmas Eve 2019 and Sears in 2020 during the Covid 19 pandemic. Most stores in both wings has not much opened storefronts but its slowly dying in my opinion. 




 















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