The venerable San Francisco-based jeweler Shreve & Co. just announced they’re closing up their Union Square shop permanently, though watch and necklace enthusiasts can clean up on 60% off liquidation sales starting this Friday.
Our headline here notes that Shreve & Co. jewelry Store is 172 years old, having opened here in 1852. But it has not been at its current 150 Post Street location those entire 172 years. The shop was bumped out of its former Post and Grant streets space in 2015 when rival jeweler Harry Winston massively outbid them for the lease on that space (ah, those were the days). They were also based in Oakland for a couple years after the 1906 earthquake. And Shreve & Co. first opened at Clay and Montgomery streets, though moved shortly thereafter and was driven out of its Post and Grant store by the earthquake, in which the jewelry famously survived in a fireproof vault — even though the vault was too hot to open for three weeks.
Regardless, now in the year 2024, the Examiner reports that Shreve & Co. is closing its Union Square store permanently. A closing date was not announced, and this appears to be a “while supplies last” kind of thing. The Examiner adds that the shop will have a “multimillion dollar liquidation sale of jewelry and watches at discounts of up to 60%,” and that the liquidation sale “will begin Friday and could last just days.”
Shreve & Co. will make its sole other remaining Palo Alto store into its new flagship, but “flagship” in this case just means the last remaining store.
In a press release, Shreve & Co. said that “dynamic changes” in the jewelry industry are forcing the closure. The company’s managing partner Lane Schiffman said in the release that “As we turn the page on this exciting new chapter, we are filled with gratitude for our journey in San Francisco.”
This isn’t Macy’s closing bad, but it’s still pretty bad for the beleaguered Union Square. Shreve’s location is 15,000 square feet, which is no small retail store. But commercial real estate brokers are putting the best face forward on the abrupt closure announcement.
“I just need people to understand that things are on an upward trajectory on a fundamental level” in Union Square, Maven Properties' Ali McEvoy told the Examiner. "There are incredible deals to be made."
The Examiner says that McEvoy insists that a “well-known day spa operator” is planning on opening up in that same Shreve building in the near future (albeit in a smaller space), and that locations which had fetched $20-per-square-foot pre-pandemic are currently fetching $5-per-square-foot.
And we should note that Shreve & Co. is no longer locally owned. The North Carolina-based Schiffman Group bought the company in bankruptcy proceedings in 1992.
Image: Tracy G. via Yelp
