The two anchor stores at Penn Hills Center are going out of business, leaving the rest of the plaza with about as much retail power as a car with the wheels pulled off. The shopping center, like four others in the area, is about to lose both an Ames and a Phar-Mor. Boarding up a once-busy store causes headaches all around — for the people who lease shopping plaza storefronts, for neighborhood customers, for smaller merchants next door who siphon off traffic from their big neighbors, for local governments that rely on thriving stores for mercantile and property taxes. Shutting two big stores only compounds the problem. Penn Hills Center, Robinson Town Centre, Cranberry Mall, Waterworks Mall near Aspinwall and Village Square Mall in Bethel Park all have been hit by the one-two punch, losing an Ames and a Phar-Mor. Rocky Hill, Conn.-based Ames Department Stores Inc. announced this month it will close all 327 stores, including 22 in the region. A consortium including Giant Eagle and CVS Pharmacy bought bankrupt Phar-Mor in July and is liquidating its 73 remaining stores, including 17 in southwestern Pennsylvania. Shoppers will have a few more weeks to pick over the dwindling inventory before the doors close for good. Marilynn McHenry, 53, of Penn Hills, spent Tuesday afternoon with her granddaughter at the Penn Hills Ames filling a cart with picture frames, school supplies and other items. Next time out, she lamented, she’ll have to waste time driving to Monroeville. “Where are you going to go in Penn Hills?” McHenry said. “There’s nothing here for us anymore.” The municipality’s only major shopping center already has several vacancies and some decidedly non-retail tenants, including a dialysis center and a driver’s license center. Denise Nixon runs four Jean’s Hallmark card shops in the region, including one in the Penn Hills plaza that is bookended by vacant stores, formerly a flower shop and an optician. Recent expansion plans have been shelved indefinitely, Nixon said, as the store slips toward becoming her worst performer. “I would hate to see another dollar store come in here,” Nixon said. “It’s hard to compete with them.” The landlord, First City Co., is already marketing the soon-to-be-vacant spaces, said Don Martin, director of property management for the Downtown firm. He said he is optimistic that two good retail tenants will be found. “Together (the center’s Ames and Phar-Mor) were doing tens of millions of dollars in sales per year,” Martin said. “We are very confident that there are some retailers out there that are going to want to meet those consumers’ needs.” Luring new tenants will be tough, according to Steven Baumgarten, retail analyst for Parker/Hunter Inc. in Pittsburgh. The tight economy is keeping most retailers chary, Baumgarten said. “I just think there’s not a lot of buyers out there, especially for a store the size of an Ames,” he said. “The majority of the growth we’re seeing is in these ‘big box’ retailers like Wal-Mart, Target, Lowe’s and Home Depot.” Chains opening new stores have a lot of choices, especially with so many new vacancies about to pop up. They can afford to be picky. “If you’re a Best Buy, do you want to put your next location next to a Wal-Mart that’s bringing in lots of traffic, or do you want to put it next to a dialysis center?” Baumgarten said. At least for now, the store closings affect high-growth and low-growth areas alike. Across the road from the brand new Mall at Robinson, the soon-to-be-defunct Ames and Phar-Mor occupy two of the biggest slots at the meandering Robinson Town Centre. “It’s a shame you’re getting down to just two stores to visit anymore — Wal-Mart and Target,” said Lynda Girimonti, 38, of Midway, making her last visit to the Robinson Ames. Cranberry Mall lost a Big K this year and an Ames last year during the retailer’s final, failed turnaround effort. Now its Phar-Mor is closing. Township Manager Jerry Andree says it’s nothing to get too worried about. “We’ve grown so large as a retail base that we sort of see it as the normal evolution of retail. As new and bigger malls get developed you see tenants moving from mall to mall, shopping center to shopping center,” he said. The former Ames, for one, is now undergoing a face-lift in preparation to become a Marshall’s. Cranberry Mall — the first major shopping plaza built in the now traffic-choked suburb — contributes about $50,000 in real estate taxes each year, Andree said. That’s less than 3 percent of all property tax revenue, he said — not peanuts, but not pivotal either. All told, the region is losing 22 Ames and 17 Phar-Mors. If Kmart, now in bankruptcy, can’t pull out, the toll could soon be worse. But losing a spate of frequent shopping stops hasn’t been much of a hindrance to Shelly Valentovish, 32, of Cranberry Township. “I’ll probably just go to Wal-Mart and Costco more,” said Valentovish, picking up birthday supplies for the last time at her local Phar-Mor.

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