The Macy's here used to be a Lazarus. I LOVED Lazarus. Ofcourse the Dillard's here also used to be McAlpin's which i thought was better than Dillards too.

I liked the Liberty House. I'm sorry to have seen it go too. However, Macy's West rocks! The flagship store in San Francisco is almost a full block on Union Square. And they have a dedicated five or six floor building (not pictured, but around the corner) just for men's wear.

http://www.mccullagh.org/db9/1ds-4/m...-francisco.jpg

I think there's a difference too between stand alone Macy's and the ones that are part of a mall. It always seems like you get better service or there is better merchandise in the huge Macy's stores that are only Macy's than you would in the stores that cater to the "mall crowd" (teenagers) instead of serious consumers.

A few months ago I cleaned out my old bedroom closet at mom's house and found some old Liberty House plastic shopping bags and t-shirt boxes. That made me happy. I ended up saving them...there was no way I was throwing them out! The t-shirt boxes I used to hold Christmas ornaments, lol.

I've been in some really nasty looking Macy's stores like the ones described above. All were not a part of the Macy's West group. Macy's West indeed rocks!

I agree with that! I think that is true of a lot of stores though, not just the larger department stores.

While at UK, one of my first - if not the first - charge cards I got then was from McAlpin's.

I'm not even marginally surprised that St. Louis is on there. This market isn't terribly friendly to outside companies buying out St. Louis institutions, and a lot of Famous Barr customers never made the switch to being Macy's customers.

MMMMMMMM Cheesecake Factory. The one that there in Macy's is my favorite CF to go to cause you get a view of the city.

We had Lazarus and Marshall Fields. I will never ever forgive Macy's for buying Marshall Fields.

I much prefer Dillards to Macy's.

I also preferred Dillards to Foley's (in Dallas) as well as Hecht's (in Nashville), both of which later became Macy's.

As has already been pointed out, their prices are a load of crap. They prey on the innocent folks who go there because of a bridal registry. I once had to buy some flatware, and the bride was only registered at Macy's. The flatware was $65. However, the exact same pattern was *reguarly* priced $45 at Dillards, and at the time that I was shopping was on sale for $35. I bought two sets at Dillards instead of the one set at Macy's/Hechts and just told the bride to adjust her registry accordingly. The same scam had been occurring with Foley's and Hechts prior to becoming Macy's.

The quality and selection of clothes has also been better at Dillards than any of the Macy's family stores. I also have had better service at Dillards.

*disclaimer- all Macy's stores that I have shopped in have been in malls, not the stand alone kind, and were not originally Macy's. Take that FWIW.

Macy's at the malls I shop at in the Seattle area are fine, and I shop there about the same amount as I do Nordstrom. But I never buy things at Macy's at full-price (they're always having a sale), and I buy all my shoes and most of my cosmetics at Nordstrom. I buy the occasional trinket at Barney's downtown, but mostly just window shop there...sigh. I NEVER shop at JC Penney or Kohl's (which just arrived here a few years ago).

Macy's purchased the beloved Bon Marche chain in the Pacific Northwest, but I haven't noticed any difference in the merchandise here.

Macy's is pretty good around these parts, with a decent men's section - I generally stick to Brooks Brothers for my work clothes, but the Macy's around here have Lacoste and other good casual clothes.

My wife and I had one of our registries at Macy's and had a good experience with it - they had most of what we wanted, and apparently they were very helpful with our wedding guests in finding the items on our registry.

I honestly think this has something to do with it. My experience is limited to the standalone stores like 34th Street here in NYC, as well as Macy's West, which is much better than Macy's on the East Coast. Granted, I very rarely shop at any Macy's--if I go to a department store, it tends to be Saks, Bergdorfs, or Bloomingdales. I like a good Nordstrom and Neiman Marcus as well.

I think Sears and JCPenney are vile.

Amen. I still miss Marshall Fields and Macy's doesn't even come close. It seems a lot of people here feel the same way and are somewhat bitter toward Macy's.