The former Macy’s building has been sold for $1,957,000 to TSM Holdings LLC, the same investment group that owns the rest of the Towne Square Mall property. The Macy’s building was most recently owned by Owensboro Indoor Sports LLC, whose plans to build an indoor sports facility were scrapped after the city and county purchased sports flooring to host events at the Owensboro Convention Center.
The deal for the Macy’s building closed Friday afternoon, according to realtor Jim Estes.
TSM Holdings purchased Towne Square Mall — minus the Macy’s building — for $5.15 million in December 2019. Gulfstream Commercial Services LLC brokered the deal and later took over management of the mall.
The Macy’s building had always been independently owned and operated separately from Towne Square Mall. After Macy’s announced they were closing that location in January 2020, it left the nearly 80,000-square foot space up for grabs.
Owensboro Indoor Sports, also a local investing group, purchased the property for $1.25 million in July 2020. Estes brokered that deal and was the spokesperson for the group at the time of purchase.
The City of Owensboro and the Owensboro-Daviess County Convention and Visitors Bureau had been in talks of creating a new indoor sports complex for years. Estes said at the time that the location checked off a lot of boxes on the City’s list of criteria for the complex.
Estes said the plans were to renovate the building to build such a complex.
But those plans were scratched after local officials announced a new indoor “sports opportunity” at the Owensboro Convention Center. It includes a modular, portable sports floor along with all the necessary equipment for multiple indoor sporting events including volleyball, basketball, pickleball and futsal. It also includes three-tiered bleachers for fans.
The project is a public-private partnership between Daviess County Fiscal Court, the City of Owensboro and Owensboro Health.
“Based on a study the city/county commissioned a few years ago, it was determined our market needed an 80,000+ square foot indoor facility to host sporting events,” Estes said Tuesday. “Our goal was to meet that need. Then the city purchased ‘sports floors’ to use at the Convention Center. As I’m sure you can imagine, it’s very difficult for a private company to compete with a public funded facility. At that point, it simply wasn’t worth the risk.”
Now, the former Macy’s building will be part of a master development plan for the mall since the entire property is under the same management for the first time ever.
“We have plans for every property that the group invests in, as far as making sure that it is part of an overall development. The Macy’s building is no different. Consolidating that entire area into single ownership just made sense so that we could develop the entire property harmonious with anything else that goes in there,” said Ed Ray, COO of TSM Holdings LLC and Gulfstream Commercial Services LLC. “We want to do a master plan for the mall space and make sure that it is developed as part of an overall master plan rather than piecemeal it together.”
Part of that plan was announced earlier Tuesday. In the biggest development news in years for the mall, Ellis Entertainment will be opening a new entertainment venue in the former JCPenney’s location after reaching a lease agreement with TSM Holdings LLC.
The venue plans to initially open with a wide selection of historical racing machines (HRMs), a simulcast betting and viewing area, and a new race- and sports-themed bar and grill.
Construction on the Ellis Park Owensboro facility is slated to start this summer, with an anticipated opening date in early 2023.
