Sign of the times: Tesla has closed its Bethesda showroom after more than a decade at Westfield Montgomery mall. A Tesla dealership on Rockville Pike — recently the site of weekly protests against Elon Musk — is now the company’s only remaining location in Montgomery County.
Elsewhere at the mall, at least four other stores are also closing or have closed in the past few weeks:
- The Ecco store, specializing in comfort shoes, will go dark this weekend after a long run. All remaining merchandise has been marked down for clearance.
- Tomato, an Egyptian chain offering clothes for men and boys, has departed after a nine-month run in two different locations.
- Merlo, a European-style furniture store, is leaving the mall after barely three months in the former Talbots space.
- Going-out-of-business sales are still in progress at Forever 21, as the fast-fashion retailer winds down business at its remaining stores.
Christa
Funny how the people who wanted electric cars to save the planet are now determined to shut down the company that makes electric cars.
john
Well there are more electric car manufacturers. Choice is good.
Kathy
Musk is a facsist, who calls works American people parasites, he needs to go back to South Africa
Bendix200
Musk never said that and actually employs 100,000+ Americans with good jobs and wages. Average salary is $80,000 not to bad at all for American workers. To bad the party that preaches tolerance practices intolerance and wants to destroy those jobs and the families that depend on them.
LVO
People have the power of the purse. Were you calling Republicans names when they were trying to cancel Bud Lite for putting a rainbow on their cans? There have been countless “cancellations” of products from both Dems and Repubs yet when Dems do it is called intolerance? Are you saying that Repubs are the party of tolerance actually? I am confused by your argument? Did you call out Jan 6th attackers as intolerant and criminal or were they patriots? Hard to follow the logic?
Musk did present as a champion for conservation and electric cars but he proved to be not that when he hitched his wagon to a climate change denying politician who accepted millions if dollars from the oil companies and then created DOGE and started firing EPA workers- doesn’t look very much like a chanpion for anything but retribution and revenge for any government agency that tried to put some regulation on his businesses. He helped cancel millions of dollars of planned charging stations all over the country…
So yeah, the people are speaking up and cancelling him and his car…that is the power of the people…whether Dem or Republican
As others have mentioned , that Tesla store was there for years before any of this and they were just a advertisement for Tesla- now with the large dealership just a few miles away, makes no sense to have it there. What is a more interesting story than any of this is why this mall can’t get any decent stores when Tysons has two malls across the street from each other and both are doing fine? The stores we get are crappy and the food court sucks…
Bendix200
Most are more expensive and frankly not as good. Musk made the EV practical for a select group of users. He led the way. Once the progressives hero, the Tesla was a symbol of holier than thou for them. Funny how things change with the party of intolerance that preaches tolerance.
Jeff
People don’t like Nazis. That’s what this is about.
But it’s nice to know that you can easily overlook that.
Bendix200
Progressive lunatics call anyone they don’t agree with Nazis. Musk gave the same wave countless of progressive democrats have and all of a sudden he is a Nazi. Shows they have nothing to go on but hysteria.
Bendix200
No worries for Tesla they have a location is Rockville. Of course the sales are dropping. Musk was once the progressives hero but as soon as he stood for freedom of speech and thought they vilified him. They are selling their Teslas once a symbol of smugness, holy than thou self importance and buying ICE powered cars, it is hilarious.
H Man
Freedom of speech? Only if you speak what he wants to hear, otherwise he’ll nix you from X.
Richard H.
I thought the owners at MM recognized long ago the shift in consumer spending.
White Flint was the first to go. Their hope to snag Amazon was unrealistic as the property was too small for them.
Lake Forest is gone as well. Rockville Town Center continues to struggle.
The models that are thriving better than most are Pike and Rose and downtown Bethesda. They are built around people, not stuff. Sure they have their failures; nothing is perfect.
The restaurant business is tough especially when competition is right next door. The successful eateries are packed.
Montgomery county needs more housing. Not cheap housing either. But it must be reasonably priced. These dying or dead malls are well located with public bus transportation hubs on site or close to the Metro.
The county needs to step up its efforts to work with developers to get the job done. A few MPDUs here and there are not enough.
Simply put, our children can no longer afford to live where they grew up.
Prices are high. It’s a not complicated why. Great demand, weak supply. Fix it now!!!!
While we’re at it. The old folks like me need to move on. However, they, too, need places to go. It doesn’t help when often the cost of a smaller place is more than their current home.
Retail demand is declining. Housing demand is rising. Solutions are taking too long. Taxes are going up. Soon population will decline. There’s a name for this. You know what it is.