For 18 years, Sylvia Gezgin operated Jewelers of Kismet at Union Station Mall in Union City.
Gezgin said she had three hours' notice that the mall was closing just before the busy holiday shopping season, when she normally gets 35 percent to 40 percent of her business.
"I have no work, I'm out of a job," she said. "This is our livelihood. We sat there all these months for November and December."
The fate of Union Station Mall’s former tenants is as uncertain as that of the shopping center after it was sold in foreclosure last week.
Gezgin is trying to relocate her store to Decatur. In the meantime, her display cases remain in the mall and she is living off savings and credit cards. Ownership of the mall was passed to a group listed as MB REO-GA Retail LLC on Tuesday for $5 million, foreclosure attorney Ted Woodward said.
The mall ended up in foreclosure in November after years of bills went unpaid by Lee Najjar. Najjar is reportedly the “Big Poppa” of “Real Housewives of Atlanta” fame for his association with Kim Zolciak. Fed up, Georgia Power plunged the mall into darkness on Nov. 2, forcing tenants to move out.
Union City Fire Marshal Larry Knowles said just one mall tenant has moved into another space in Union City, the tattoo parlor Lucky Stars. Owner Marcus Hardy said relocating cost him $1,000 more than he would have paid in November rent, in addition to lost business because the mall shut down with no warning.
While Hardy said winter is traditionally a slow time of year for tattoos, business has dropped off even more than would be expected with the new nearby location at 6740 Shannon Parkway.
“People don’t know we’re over here,” he said. “We don’t get nearly as much foot traffic. ... It’s just not going to be going as well as it should be now.”
Hardy had not yet paid his November rent, but others, such as Gezgin, did. She has not been reimbursed the $4,094, including utilities, she paid.
Sears and Macy's are the only stores that are currently open. Sears manager Jim Cordwell said he is still gauging the effect of the closure.
Tuesday afternoon, the parking lots at Sears and Macy’s were sparsely populated. A solid, translucent gate ensured that Sears shoppers could not access the empty mall. Signs had been removed from many of the stores and some kiosks were covered by sheets, though potted plants remained. Security guard Paul West said the plants were being watered.
Workers loaded the contents of the Great American Cookies store into a moving truck outside a main entrance.
Tenants were originally told Union Station would be closed for just two days while the power situation was worked out.
Jeff Wilson, a spokesman for Georgia Power, said Najjar didn’t honor “numerous negotiated agreements” on his account. But Wilson would not say how much Najjar was delinquent or when he last paid. Najjar said last week that he was frustrated with Georgia Power for not working with him on the electric bill.
Bruce Williams, who now works for Thomas Enterprises in Newnan, helped the late developer Scott Hudgens build Shannon Mall on the site of a former rock quarry.
He said when the mall opened it was very successful.
Since then, other malls have siphoned off customers and blocked the mall’s reach.
Newer rivals include Arbor Place Mall in Douglasville, Fayette Pavilion in Fayetteville, the Forum at Ashley Park in Newnan, Camp Creek MarketPlace near the airport and Southlake Mall in Morrow.
“Shannon Mall was just outpositioned over a period of time,” Williams said. “And the demographics in that area didn’t grow enough to support Shannon Mall while new and bigger centers were built.”
So Union Station merchants sold lower echelon goods, said Stan Thomas of Thomas Enterprises, who built two nearby retail centers that cut into Union Station’s customer base.
“They merchandize to what product they think moves and what the customer base is,” Thomas said, “and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.”
While traffic through the mall had been slow, it still had customers.
Carlotta Peart has shopped at Union Station so often during lunch breaks from her job at Delta Air Lines’ headquarters that she’s on a first-name basis with “Miss Brenda” and other sales staff at Macy’s.
On Thursday, she stood outside Macy’s — with its huge white banner proclaiming “We Are Open” — and pondered its closing.
“I’m already dreading Southlake, and I don’t want to travel to Buckhead,” Peart said. “There’s so much drama to park there.”
Staff writer Tammy Joyner contributed to this article.
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