The Belk store in Metrocenter will close by the end of August, but the Pemberton Square mall location will continue with business as usual, spokesmen said.

Gary Siler, senior vice president of the Belk’s Western Divisional office in Birmingham, Ala., said no changes are expected at the store here.

“We’re having a good year. We’re very enthused and excited about the Vicksburg market,” he said.

Belk is one of the anchor tenants here and in the west Jackson mall, about 35 minutes from Vicksburg on Interstate 20.

Vicksburg resident Christine Buchanan, 80, who was shopping Tuesday for her friend’s 90th birthday, said, “The one closing in Jackson wouldn’t affect me. I don’t drive that way much anymore.”

The Metrocenter store is closing because sales “dropped to a point where it doesn’t make sense to keep it open,” Siler said. “We couldn’t run a profitable store in that location.”

Ralph Pitts, corporate spokesman in Charlotte, N.C., said the Jackson site played a major part in the company’s decision rather than the economy.

“We tried to shrink the store,” said Pitts. “That mall had experienced a serious decline in business for years.”

Marie Cole, 54, of Port Gibson, said she mainly shops at the Vicksburg Belk, though she once shopped at the Metrocenter store years ago.

“I stopped shopping there out of fear,” she said of the area’s crime rate.

The store is preparing to shift business to its Flowood location and Northpark location in Ridgeland, Siler said. The more than 60 employees at the Metrocenter location have been guaranteed jobs at the Ridgeland and Flowood stores, Pitts said.

“They were all offered opportunities to be associates at those two stores,” Pitts said. “I don’t know how many will accept.”

Belk has not made new plans for the nearby locations, Siler said, but “business is very healthy in the other stores.”

Belk Inc. bought the McRae’s stores in the Pemberton Square in 2005 and the Metrocenter about five years ago from Saks Inc., Siler said.

With sales totaling $3.5 billion last fiscal year, the corporation is the nation’s largest privately owned department store.

The company has expanded its retail leadership position in southern markets with more than 300 stores in 16 states by acquiring Proffitt’s, McRae’s and Parisian department store groups from Saks Inc. in 2005 and 2006.

*

Contact Tish Butts at tbutts@vicksburgpost.com