AntSol Travel

Are you staying in the Anaheim Resort area and need to get groceries during your stay? There is Target at Harbor & Chapman, Vons farther down Chapman, and CVS and Walgreens at Harbor & Katella. However, if you want Trader Joe’s for groceries? You have to go six miles down Katella in Orange at the Village at Orange mall. Let’s go!

To get there, according to Google Maps, let’s take the OC Bus 50 line east to the Village at Orange, a six mile- 33 minute bus ride from Katella & Harbor, or a 19 minute car drive if you take a rideshare or if you brought your own car.

The Village At Orange, Now

Located down the congested roads of Katella Avenue & Tustin Street, is the Village at Orange, an older regional shopping center dating back to 1971 with over 800,000 sq ft of retail space on 60 acres of land. They have space for 80 retailers & restaurants, surrounded by a huge parking lot. However, with many retailers going bankrupt over the last couple decades, shift to more e-commerce, and stores deciding to close up shop after the events of 2020, the Village at Orange has fallen from grace like many indoor regional malls of the late 20th century. 

Village at Orange starts at Tustin & Meats, where Trader Joe’s & CVS is right by the street corner. You can get your groceries at Trader Joe’s and pick up your prescription at the adjacent CVS.

With plenty of car traffic, you would be somewhat right if you think it is a strip mall, which it seems more like it is from the front with massive parking, restaurants, grocery stores, and more. It actually had an indoor mall area, a JCPenny that closed in 2017, and a huge former Sears store that predated the mall being added, closed in April 2021. The only Sears in SoCal that are left as of March 2024 are in Whittier and Burbank, according to the Sears locations finder. 

Before the Indoor Mall’s Closure

Indoor mall portion closed in January 2024, which I visited before it closed back in November 2023. Many retailers inside already closed shops, having a liquidation sale, or try to look like business as normal as staff & inventory will move to other locations.

Staff at chain locations such as Bath & Body Works can either transfer to the nearby location, such as the Outlets at Orange or the Brea Mall, however, if the commute does not work, the staff can quit.

Independent stores like the piano store, have to liquidate their inventory if they don’t have any other stores and quit the business.

Due to the weird fusion of indoor regional mall and outdoor strip mall with many outdoor facing stores & restaurants, it worked for the Village at Orange to close the indoor portion as it was not worth it for the owners to keep it open. There were plans to redevelop the mall, however, nothing has come to fruition, more on that shortly. 

Ownership

The mall is currently owned by Terramar Retail Centers, or more commonly known as TRC Retail. According to the OC Register, TRC Retail bought the Village at Orange in November 2016 from Vestar for $84.5 million dollars. At the time, 92% of the Village of Orange’s stores were occupied. However, after reopening from the 2020 closures with only 19/80 = 23.75% of their units are open now. They seem to be okay for now until redevelopment plans are set. 

What is left at this point?

What stores & resturants are left at this point? Along the frontage of Tustin Street are Trader Joe’s, CVS, Jamba Juice, Panera Bread, Noodles & Co., and Yogurtland. Along the outdoor-facing units of the mall are 24 Hour Fitness, HomeGoods, Crumbl Cookies, Super Dumpling, Red Robin, Sprouts, and Walmart. Then there are ancillary shops along Tustin that include an Olive Garden, Orangetheory Fitness, The Habit Burger, Petsmart, a nail salon, and an eyelash salon. The nineteen stores & restaurants are able to keep plenty of foot traffic to the mall afloat, there just won’t be as much foot traffic as before with the indoor mall portion closed. 

What might happen in the future? As of March 2024, nothing is fully set in stone at all. There were plans to add housing with Assembly Bill 2011, to allow housing on commercial land. However, it requires building residential along Tustin Street, however, the city of Orange’s general plans did not really allow that due to the affordable housing requirements and stalled the development planning process. So nothing has been planned for now. 

For now, the Village at Orange serves the city of Orange well with its variety of restaurants & shops that are proto-typical of a strip mall. The loss of the indoor mall was a huge loss for many independent stores who had to close up shop. Despite that, the Village at Orange will be my go-to place if I need to buy Trader Joe’s groceries.