Laurier Québec is one of Canada's largest shopping malls. It is located in Quebec City, Quebec. Though Galeries de la Capitale is the biggest mall in the city in terms of area, Laurier Quebec remains the largest by number of tenants. It has approximately 300 stores and restaurants and is built on three levels with underground, multilevel, and outdoor parking. Major tenants include La Baie d'Hudson, Best Buy, Toys "R" Us, Marshalls and Walmart. Other tenants include jewellery, gift, shoe, book, eyeware, music, toy, electronics, clothing, hardware, and pet stores as well as hair and beauty salons. Four of the original 50 tenants from 1961 are still in the mall: Reitmans, the Laurier Comneuf cordwainer shop, the Doucet jewellery store, and the Laurier dry-cleaner. The mall was noteworthy for having two Zellers stores at the same time in the 1990s and two Dominion supermarkets in the 1960s.
History
1960s
Place Laurier was the first indoor mall in the province of Quebec. It opened on November 11, 1961, as a two-level mall with 50 stores including anchors Pascal, Syndicat, Kresge's, Towers, Dominion Stores as well as an office building with eight floors known as Tour Frontenac. They were shortly joined by a Paquet store. In 1964, an expansion occur in both extremities of Place Laurier. In the western part, a new mall section of three floors was built on Towers' original anchor space. The first floor of this western expansion constituted of the relocated Towers store, a second Dominion supermarket, and a Marquis de Montcalm restaurant. The second floor was reserved for a relocated Syndicat, the first level of a new Norman store as well as a branch of the Bank of Montreal. The third floor was mostly for the second level of Norman. In total, 403,000 square feet was added in this western expansion of three floors. In the eastern side of the mall, Pascal increased its size by 30% in absorbing Paquet's original location. The latter moved in a brand new two-level building of 131,980 square feet and inaugurated its new store on April 14, 1964.
1970s
An expansion to the north welcomed a two-level Sears store of 160,000 square feet and a new mall section of 48 boutiques spread on three floors for an additional 100,000 square feet of retail space. Sears opened on October 7, 1971 under its then-name of Simpsons-Sears. It was Sears' second store in the Quebec City area and its third in the province of Quebec as a whole. The rest of the northern section inaugurated in 1972. By 1976 Place Laurier was already well over 1 million square feet with 300 stores, making it the largest shopping mall in Canada at the time. It was still by far the largest shopping mall in Quebec City in 1980 as Galeries de la Capitale had yet to open. La compagnie Paquet merged in the 1970s with Syndicat de Québec store chain. Despite the merger, Paquet and Syndicat retained their respective stores at Place Laurier.
1980s
Paquet and Syndicat both declared bankruptcy in 1981. A 80,920 square feet single-level Zellers opened on November 3, 1982 in one of the two floors of the closed Paquet store. As for Syndicat's vacant space, it was eventually subdivided by anchors Toyville and Wise, a General Motorscar dealership and some 10 stores. An expansion to the south installed in September 15, 1982 a two-level La Baie store and a new mall section of 65 boutiques spread on two floors. 130,000 square feet of retail space was brought by La Baie alone and another 129,534 for the boutiques. Provigo closed its doors in 1986. At this point, Place Laurier has undergone nine expansions between 1961 and 1986. The mall's anchors in 1989 were Bonimart, La Baie Pascal, Sears, Toyville, Wise and Zellers.
1990s
Pascal went bankrupt in 1991, leaving Toys "R" Us to occupy 40,000 square feet of the vacant space. Zellers acquired the Bonimart chain in 1990. On April 14, 1991, Zellers converted Bonimart into its nameplate resulting in Place Laurier having two department stores with the same name. In the summer of 1996, the Zellers on the east side of the mall closed and was replaced by boutiques, while Zellers on the west end was enlarged to reach 135,000 square feet.
2000s
2010s
Another expansion welcomed a Best Buy store on September 14, 2011. The Zellers store that was formerly Towers/Bonimart closed its doors on December 17, 2012. Target Canada replaced it on October 18, 2013. Following Target's exit from the Canadian market in April 2015, Walmart Canada acquired the lease and opened its supercenter on October 20, 2016. Marshalls inaugurated on August 25, 2016 in the space vacated by Future Shop. Sears closed with the rest of the chain on January 14, 2018. In 2020, the existing Sports Experts in the mall will relocate in half of Sears's former local to open the largest store in the province under that banner.
