Merry Hill Shopping Centre Hill included several multiple stores including clothing retailers: C&A and Littlewoods, general department store British Home Stores and supermarket chain Sainsburys, as well as numerous smaller retailers. On 23 October 1990, Marks & Spencer opened a new department store at Merry Hill (the final new store to open at the complex), replacing the recently closed stores in nearby Dudley and West Bromwich. The retailer had agreed to become tenants of a store at Merry Hill during the summer of 1989, but had hoped to keep their Dudley and West Bromwich stores open alongside it; however the declining trade in both
Merry Hill Shopping Centre autumn 1989, when construction began on The Waterfront development, which consisted of Phases 6-8. Phase 6 saw the construction of of offices (the first of which were occupied in December 1990), Phase 7 saw the construction of of restaurants and bars and Phase 8 saw the addition of a business park, which was completed in 1995. Waterfront Way was opened in early-December 1990 to serve the new complex and provide a road link to the shopping centre and also to the main A461 road. The Waterfront development created some 4,000 jobs, but the onset of the recession in 2008 saw