Background

Chapel Hill Mall sits on land once owned by Richard Buchholzer's father, Julius Johannes "J.J." Buchholzer. In the 1930s, a then-teenage Richard found what appeared to be an old Native American council circle on his father's land. Because of this, Richard would later name the development "Chapel Hill", referring to the idea that the council circle was the Native "equivalent of a chapel."^[5][6]

In 1932, during the Great Depression, J.J. Buchholzer became the owner of a Hower's department store in downtown Akron.^[7] The Buchholzers anticipated that the city of Akron would expand to the north, and they felt that another Hower's store should be built on their land. They later decided to build a climate-controlled shopping mall instead, predicting that it would provide them greater economic opportunities. J.J. Buchholzer died in 1960, and Richard assumed his duties as executive officer of the Hower's. Buchholzer soon teamed up with Forest City Enterprises to build what would be Akron's first indoor mall. Plans were ready by 1963, but before the mall opened, Edward J. DeBartolo Corporation built Summit Mall on the west side of Akron.^[5]

Opening and early period (1967 - 1970)

A few stores, opened in 1966 before the mall proper.^[5] Gray Drug Stores opened on November 17.^[8] JCPenney and Sears also opened their doors before the rest of the mall.

Chapel Hill Mall officially opened on October 12, 1967.^[9][10]

Peak period (1971 - 2013)

Expansion plans to include a Higbee's store came up numerous times in the late 1980s and early 1990s. A plan was considered in 1988 by part-owner Forest City Enterprises. It included a 90,000-square-foot (8,400 m²) addition for an additional department store.^[11] Expansion was again mentioned in 1989.^[12] A front-page story on the January 31, 1990 edition of the Akron Beacon Journal read "Higbee's Coming to Chapel Hill Mall", and said that the store, along with a food court and additional retail space, would be open by Fall 1991.^[13]

In 1994, the mall's owners added a food court and retail expansion, as well as new flooring and ceiling tiles, a new fountain, and new lighting.^[14][15]

Buchholzer and Forest City Enterprises owned the mall until September 2004, when it was sold to the Chattanooga, Tennessee company CBL & Associates Properties, Inc.,^[16] who owned it until 2014.

In 2015, Sears Holdings spun off 235 of its properties, including the Sears at Chapel Hill Mall, into Seritage Growth Properties.^[17]

Decline and closure (2014-2021)

The mall gradually began to decline, and in March 2016, Macy's permanently closed their Chapel Hill Mall location,^[18][19] citing "disappointing" holiday sales.^[20]

On July 15, 2016, Kohan Retail Investment Group, owned by Michael Kohan, bought Chapel Hill Mall for $8.6 million with plans to revitalize the location and focus on attracting younger customers.^[21] On January 4, 2017, Sears Holdings announced that the Chapel Hill Sears store would be closing the following spring due to declining sales.^[22] By August 2018, "about a quarter" of the storefronts were vacant.^[23]

Former Express, Macy's Concourse

Mall tenants received multiple notices from the City of Akron of potential utility shutoff in 2019^[24] and 2020 due to accumulating unpaid water and electricity bills.^[25] The City decided to cancel the shutoffs due to partial payments received from Kohan,^[26][27] but the overall debt continued to accumulate, and in September 2019 the Summit County fiscal office began to discuss the possibility of foreclosing on the property after they received a notice from the City about the delinquent account.^[28]

On January 3, 2020, Ohio Edison filled a complaint against Kohan, citing over $195,000 of overdue bills. On January 13, Kohan was served with a foreclosure notice for over $750,000 of unpaid bills owed to Summit County.^[29] Retail taxes, which had not been paid since January 2019, made up over half of the amount owed, including interest and fees.^[30]

On January 16, 2020, it was announced that the Chapel Hill JCPenney would close on April 24, 2020 as part of a plan to close six stores nationwide, leaving the mall with no remaining anchors.^[31] It remained open through the initial closing date, but on June 17 it was included in an updated list of 136 stores closing.^[32] The JCPenney store officially closed in July 2020.

On March 16, 2021, Industrial Commercial Properties purchased the Chapel Hill property^[33] for $7 million, of which $844,085.24 went to the County to pay off previous debts.^[34]

At this time, only 20 out of 75 available storefronts were in use, including kiosks.^[35]

The Chapel Hill Mall closed permanently on April 18, 2021.

Chapel Hill Business Park

The property is now a business park with a focus on light manufacturing and other industrial uses. As of September 2023, the main building is occupied by three tenants: Craft33, Driverge, and Quantix. A few smaller suites remain vacant, and areas in what used to be the mall parking lot are now leased to tenants such as Firestone.^[36] Much of the building that used to be the Chapel Hill Mall underwent renovations in 2022; the outside of the building received new paint and landscaping,^[37] and interior walls were removed or repurposed to create a more open floor plan for the new tenants. Development on the site is still underway and is planned to include a new free-standing building near the original structure.^[38]

The carousel is planned to be moved to Lock 3 Park in downtown Akron.^[39]

Anchor tenants

The mall had three large suites available for anchor tenants.

The first anchor suite was occupied by JCPenney throughout almost the entire history of the mall. It opened in 1966, before the rest of the mall opened officially, and it was one of the last stores to close, remaining until July 2020–6 months after the foreclosure announcement.

Sears was the second anchor when the mall opened in 1967, and remained there until 2017.

The third anchor suite changed hands several times. It was originally occupied by local chain O'Neil's from 1967 until 1989, then May Co. until 1993, then Kaufmann's until 2006, when it became Macy's, which then closed in 2016.^[40] From there the suite remained unoccupied until the mall's final closing.

Other tenants

There used to be a multi-screen cinema at the mall as well. It opened in October 1966 as a two-screen theater, and eventually expanded to five screens. In 1987, General Cinemas–owner of the mall's cinema–opened an 8-screen multiplex just west of the mall, and in October 1996, Regal Cinemas opened their 10-screen theater immediately south of the mall. Less than two weeks later, the General Cinemas at the mall closed,^[41] and Old Navy took over the former theater until it closed in 2016. Woolworth also operated a store at the mall until 1997, and was later replaced by The Gap, Inc.

Archie the Talking Snowman

Archie the Talking Snowman was a 20-foot tall machine designed to look like the iconic archetype of the snowman; he had a smiling face with glowing eyes, wore a top hat, scarf, buttons, and gloves, and held a large broom in one hand while raising the other hand in greetings. Archie played the role of the interactive winter holiday feature which was common at other indoor shopping malls at the time. A child would speak into a microphone in front of Archie, and he appeared to reply and make casual conversation, and he would ask the child about their preferred Christmas gifts. In reality, Archie was controlled by an actor located in another room who could see the speaker while also concealing his actual location. The actor would speak into a microphone, and the sound would be emitted from speakers hidden inside the snowman's body to create the illusion that the speech originated from Archie.^[42]

Carousel

The Chapel Hill Mall Carousel was a well-known feature of the mall. It was located in the food court. After the mall closed, the carousel was moved to Lock 3 Park in Akron.