A year after the collapse of Hudson’s Bay Company, many of the retailer’s former locations across Canada remain empty, highlighting the challenges of repurposing large department store spaces.
The 355-year-old company filed for creditor protection in March 2025 under the weight of about $1.1 billion in debt, triggering a complicated restructuring process that led to the closure of 80 Hudson’s Bay stores and 16 Saks-branded locations across the country.
An analysis by The Canadian Press shows that at least 73 former Hudson’s Bay and Saks stores remain vacant, although some properties are in the process of being redeveloped or prepared for new tenants.
Several of the empty locations sit in prime retail areas, including shopping districts near CF Toronto Eaton Centre, Ottawa’s ByWard Market, and downtown cores in Vancouver, Montreal and Calgary.
New Businesses Moving Into Some Spaces
Despite the large number of empty properties, some former locations have already been repurposed.
Retail company YM Inc. has taken over 14 former Hudson’s Bay and Saks sites with its brands Urban Behaviour and Urban Planet. Other properties have been filled by discount clothing chains, furniture retailers and entertainment businesses.
Some developments include:
- A rebooted Zellers store inside a former Hudson’s Bay space at Londonderry Mall in Edmonton
- A Goodwill Industries store replacing Saks Off Fifth on Toronto’s Queensway
- Bowling and entertainment operator Splitsville moving into a former Saks location in Pickering by 2026
At Oakville Place mall west of Toronto, Nations Experience plans to open a grocery store and food hall inside a former Hudson’s Bay space by early 2027.
Massive Spaces Hard to Fill
Retail experts say filling these large properties is challenging because the department store model has declined while online shopping continues to grow.
According to real estate firm JLL, the average Canadian mall lease is about 3,700 square feet, while Hudson’s Bay locations averaged roughly 152,000 square feet per store — about 40 times larger than typical retail units.
Don Gregor of Aurora Retail Group said landlords are still evaluating options.
“When I’m talking to people like Oxford, Cadillac Fairview, Primaris, they’re still working on logistics on how to use or break up the space,” he said.
Future Redevelopment Plans
Many of the massive properties will likely be divided into smaller retail spaces or redeveloped entirely.
JLL predicts 65 per cent of Hudson’s Bay retail space could be leased within two years, but most locations will require multiple tenants to fill the area. Another 22 per cent of sites may be redeveloped into mixed-use projects such as condos, offices or community hubs.
One of the most ambitious proposals is in Montreal, where the James Bay Eeyou Corporation and developer JHD Immobilier want to transform a former Hudson’s Bay building on Ste-Catherine Street into an Indigenous cultural centre, fur trade museum, hotel and commercial complex.
While the transformation of these properties is underway, the widespread vacancies illustrate the lasting impact of one of Canada’s most historic retail collapses.