Miracle Mart (Canada)
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Miracle Mart was a discount department stores chain in Ontario and Quebec, Canada, founded in 1961 as a joint venture between Quebec-based grocery chain Steinberg and Vancouver-based department store Woodward's. The partnership rapidly ended and Miracle Mart became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Steinberg in 1962.
Miracle Mart operated at mid-level and competed with the likes of Towers/Bonimart, Zellers, Woolco and Kmart. There was also a spinoff grocery chain, Miracle Food Mart, that operated exclusively in Ontario. In order to provide photographic film-processing services at Miracle Mart stores, a company was created by the Greenberg brothers, named Angreen Photo, which evolved into Astral Photo and is now giant Astral Media.
The chain was facing financial problems since the early 1970s. In 1986, Steinberg closed several Miracle Mart department stores, including all stores in Ontario outside of the Ottawa area. The remaining stores in Quebec and Ottawa that didn't closed were renamed M, and the Miracle Mart name disappeared. The size of some Miracle Mart stores was also reduced upon their conversions as M stores. This rebranding strategy by the chain proved to be ineffective, as the M department chain was struggling financially and turned out to be as unsuccessful as its ancestor Miracle Mart.
The logo of M was pink from 1986 to 1991. In an attempt to capture the volatile retail sector, M modified its logo in late 1991 from pink to red, and added the word "aubaines" in diagonal and attached letters on the logo. But this wasn't enough. The M stores were liquidated in 1992, virtually the same time parent company Steinberg went bankrupt.
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[edit] Locations
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[edit] Quebec
- Brossard - Mail Champlain
- Chateauguay - Boul D'Anjou
- Chicoutimi - Place du Saguenay (burned in 1980, never reconstructed)
- Côte Saint-Luc - Cavendish Mall (closed in the 1980s, not rebranded as a M store)
- Charlesbourg - Galeries Charlesbourg
- Dollard-des-Ormeaux - Galeries des Sources
- Greenfield Park - Place Greenfield Park (closed in the 1980s, not rebranded as a M store)
- Hull, Quebec - Les Galeries de Hull
- Jonquiere - Place Centre Ville (closed in 1986, not rebranded as a M store)
- Lachine - Galeries Lachine
- Lasalle - Place Lasalle
- Laval - Carrefour Laval
- Laval - Centre commercial St. Martin (closed in the 1980s, not rebranded as a M store)
- Laval - Plaza Pont-Viau
- Longueuil - Place Longueuil
- Montreal - Place Alexis Nihon
- Montreal - Place Versailles
- Montreal - Plaza Côte-des-Neiges (closed in the 1980s, not rebranded as a M store)
- Saint-Bruno - Les Promenades Saint-Bruno
- Sainte-Foy - Place Sainte-Foy
- Saint-Léonard - Jean-Talon Street East
- Sherbrooke - Place Belvedere
- Sorel - Place Sorel
- Trois-Rivières - Centre Les Rivières
[edit] Ontario
- Bramalea - Bramalea City Centre (closed in the 1970s)
- Cambridge - Cambridge Centre (Former John Galt Centre - closed in the 1980s)
- London - Westown Plaza Mall (closed in the 1980s)
- Markham - Markville Mall
- Ottawa - Bayshore Shopping Centre
- Ottawa - Fairlawn Plaza
- Ottawa - Merivale Road at Meadowlands Drive
- St. Catharines - The Pen Centre (closed in the 1970s)
- Scarborough/Toronto - Scarborough Town Centre (closed in 1986)
- Windsor - Devonshire Mall (closed in the 1980s)
