Gift Retailer Found in Hundreds of Malls Reopens Flagship After Major Expansion

Who ever said that in-store shopping was dead?

Among the stops during your visits to the mall back in the day might have been Spencer's - and the popular retailer is still going strong with a recent expansion.

Out of the major project came the reopening of the chain's 60-year-old flagship store in New Jersey, Patch.com reports. It now has a larger sales floor and a new, revamped look for shoppers who are still grasping at that nostalgic thrill of browsing in person. C'mon, online shopping just isn't the same, is it?

Spencer's held the grand reopening event at Cherry Hill Mall earlier this month, where the chain had opened its first-ever brick-and-mortar store in 1963.

The retailer, known for pop culture gifts, gag items, T-shirts, lava lamps and risqué merchandise, has been part of the mall for more than 60 years, the U.S. Sun reports. Its new location in the mall's JCPenney wing includes around 2,700 square feet of sales space - reportedly up from about 1,750 square feet at its previous spot.

A plaque outside the store identifies the site as Store #001, honoring Cherry Hill as Spencer's first retail location. And a faux cornerstone near the entrance also features the year 1947, when the company began as a mail-order catalog business.

The company started as Spencer Gifts in Pennsylvania before taking its current name in 2003. It has since grown to more than 680 stores, as well as an online marketplace.

The chain still sells nostalgic favorites such as whoopee cushions and lava lamps, but its product range has also expanded heavily over the generations, the U.S. Sun also noted.

"Spencer's is about self-expression and discovering something unexpected," Lori Tesoro, Spencer's director of public relations, recently told Patch. "We want customers to leave having had fun and feeling like Spencer's is a place they can always be themselves, no matter who that is."

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This story was originally published July 7, 2026 at 9:20 PM.