Going, going, gone

st1\:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) } /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; mso-ascii- mso-ascii-theme- mso-fareast- mso-fareast-theme- mso-hansi- mso-hansi-theme- mso-bidi- mso-bidi-theme-} The chain once touted as America”™s love letter to a collegian”™s heart is closing doors in Kingston and Nanuet”™s Palisades Center.

Steve and Barry”™s meteoric rise from campus outlet to megamall mainstay ended in economic freefall.

Clothes, cars, homes and luxury vacations became subplots for Long Island buddies Steve Shore and Barry Prevor, who attended different schools, but came up with an idea to knock-off expensive college gear and market it for the “have-less” spender. You could pay a fortune for an Ivy League degree, or you could leave the mall looking like you did.

Malls with space to fill found the store”™s formula ”“ everything under $10 ”“ on a scale of economics that would draw in spenders, particularly if these mega stores were placed near the entrance. Now that the glitz has gone, the pair of former trailblazers are hastily reorganizing what”™s left of their largesse after declaring Chapter 11 in July.

The store is now moving forward with the remaining 170-plus stores through BH S&B Holdings L.L.C. The newly formed investment firms Bay Harbor Management and York Capital Management will try to bring Steve and Barry”™s back into the black with the stores not sold off.

Stores like Steve and Barry”™s are not the only ones suffering from a lack of consumer confidence or a glut of choices, as evidenced by week retail figures across the nation.

Home Depot and Lowe”™s Home Improvements continue to duke it out over do-it-yourselfers. The battle is already simmering between Home Depot in the town of Monroe and a new Lowe”™s HomeImprovement Center in the village of Chester.

There”™s some comfort if you”™re not old enough to remember E.J. Korvettes, S. Klein, Rickels and others that retailed before the current crop of national chains. You know that business is cyclical. Old stores go and new ones come up through the ranks, and the cycle begins again. This time, however, with the economy in a muddle, it can”™t happen soon  enough.