Do You Blame Them? Nordstrom Follows Other Major Businesses, Leaves Crime Infested San Francisco

Nordstrom is closing both of its two downtown San Francisco stores due to the “deteriorating situation” in the area. This makes them officially the largest chain business to close a location in the crime-heavy city. 

Nordstrom announced that they would be closing their Westfield Mall store as well as another nearby Nordstrom Rack in a note given to store employees on Tuesday. The company cites that “the dynamics of the downtown San Francisco market have changed dramatically over the past several years, impacting customer foot traffic to our stores and our ability to operate successfully,” per ABC 7 News. 

Nordstrom now joins Office Depot, The Container Store, Anthropologie, and Saks Off 5th in closing in the California city. The changes to the city's commercial sector are undoubtedly a result of the increasing crime rates and deteriorating quality in the bay area.

Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield (URW), the owner of the Westfield mall where the Nordstrom store is closing, blamed it entirely on the current quality of the city. The company has pleaded with city officials to fix the problems, but ultimately to no avail.
“The planned closure of Nordstrom underscores the deteriorating situation in downtown San Francisco,” a spokeswoman for URW said. “A growing number of retailers and businesses are leaving the area due to the unsafe conditions for customers, retailers, and employees, coupled with the fact that these significant issues are preventing an economic recovery of the area.”

The Westfield Mall location is set to close by the end of August, while the Nordstrom Rack on Market Street has a set closing date of July 1st. 

So far, twenty businesses have left the San Francisco Union Square since 2020, with three of them being in just the last week, according to The San Francisco Standard. 

San Francisco has attempted to claim that, according to data, the city has relatively low crime rates compared to other major metropolitan cities. However, according to Fox News, much of this is due to having DAs that are “pro-criminal and not going to enforce the law.”

Regardless of the data, it’s clear the city is on a decline, and very possibly from the abundance of crime. San Francisco can never hope to make a recovery until they plan on establishing a proper rule of law in the city. Until then, the Golden City can only hope to rot at a slower pace than it is now.