Sage-Allen

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Sage-Allen was a former mid-market department store chain based in Hartford, Connecticut. The store was a fixture in southern New England and anchored a number of smaller local and regional shopping centers in Connecticut and Massachusetts and later New Hampshire.

Known for its stylish yet 'sensible' apparel, home goods, accessories and childrens wear, its downtown Hartford flagship store was considered a smaller but respected rival to the much larger and dominant G. Fox & Co. store a block away. Also featured was a free standing 'Sage-Allen' clock that was located on the Main Street sidewalk in front of the store, and was a meeting place for many generations of shoppers. The clock, which was local a landmark, blew down in a severe windstorm in 1992. Although removed, the clock's remains have not been recovered and are still missing.

Sage-Allen rode the wave of post-World War II suburban expansion much earlier than rival G.Fox, and at first opened in a number of smaller village center locales prior to the more modern shopping centers and mall locations a generation later. A reliably successful but unflashy store, the company nonetheless began a slow decline in the mid to late 1980's which was accelerated by the severe recession that hit the region in the early 1990's.

In a move to bolster the retailer's profitability, a merger was formed with another small regional department store chain, Dey Brothers located in Syracuse, New York. That company, a five store 'leftover' retail division of the former Allied Department Stores Co. had its operations and management merged with the Sage-Allen group. Many retail analysts however thought the merger to be ill-conceived, considering that combining the weakening Sage-Allen with the equally troubled Dey Brothers operation strengthened neither company. Considering that the regional economies of each store's market were in severe decline, the chances for success were slim.

However, despite the challenges the resulting company, Sage-Dey, made a number of bold moves including shuttering both the Sage-Allen flagship in Hartford and the Dey Bros. flagship in downtown Syracuse in 1990, and opening a large Sage-Allen branch in the new Shops at Buckland Hills mall (fomerly the Pavilions at Buckland Hills) in Manchester, Connecticut. These efforts were not enough to survive the challenging retail environment, and with the deepening recession and heightened competition for the dwindling middle class consumer, Sage-Dey eventually filed for Chapter 11 in 1992, and the company ceased operations in 1994.

Some well located branches, such as Westfarms Mall and Buckland Hills Mall became expanded dual locations for the May Company's Filene's division, but most of the remaining smaller strip center locations were converted to big box stores, and several less desirable locations remained vacant for many years.

The downtown Hartford flagship building remained vacant for almost 15 years until 2005, when a developer bought the block and small parking lot behind the store and began construction on a new market rate residential project and some street level retail space. The project partially utilizes the Sage-Allen buildings while combining them with new construction and a parking facility.

1 Former locations

[edit] Former locations

[edit] Connecticut

Hartford: Downtown (Freestanding), closed, 9/1990, building partially converted to new residential development 2006
West Hartford Center (freestanding) closed in the late 1980's
Farmington: Westfarms, 1974, converted to Filene's Men's & Home store 1994, now Macy's
Avon: Farmington Valley Mall, 1972, converted to Bed, Bath & Beyond, Mall demolished 2004, now Shops at Farmington Valley
Bristol: Bristol Center Mall, 1984, closed 1990, mall to be demolished 2007
Wethersfield: Silas Deane Highway (Freestanding), 1957
Manchester: Buckland Hills Mall, 1989, subdivided into Filene's Mens & Home store and mall food court in 1994, Filene's store itself replaced in 2005
Stamford: Ridgeway Center, 1986
Trumbull: Hawley Lane Mall, 1982, converted to Steinbach, converted to Best Buy
Old Saybrook: Boston Post Road (Freestanding)
Mansfield: Eastbrook Mall
Enfield: Enfield Mall (now Enfield Commons) anchor, closed 198?, converted to Bob's