Ross Dress for Less to open in West Babylon July 18
Ross Dress for Less will open in the former Big Lots at 501 Montauk Highway on July 18, adding a fifth Long Island store next to Lidl.
Ross Dress for Less will open its West Babylon store on July 18 at 501 Montauk Highway, taking over the former Big Lots space next to Lidl and adding another discount option to a busy Suffolk retail corridor. The opening gives Ross its fifth Long Island location, following earlier stores in Hempstead, Farmingville, Riverhead and Lake Grove.
The new store will keep unusually long hours for a suburban value retailer, opening at 8:30 a.m. daily and staying open until 11:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday, midnight on Friday and Saturday, and 11 p.m. on Sunday. Ross says its stores sell discounted clothing, shoes, home decor and more, with prices, styles, colors and items varying by location, a mix that turns each visit into a search for what is on hand that day.
That format fits a stretch of Montauk Highway where convenience and bargain shopping already drive foot traffic. Lidl’s West Babylon store at 531 Montauk Highway sits nearby, and West Babylon’s second Lidl opened in September 2021 after the grocer converted former Best Market sites. Ross now lands in a corridor that has already proven it can support repeated trips from shoppers looking for lower prices close to home.
The opening also fills a vacancy created by a much larger retail shakeout. Big Lots filed for bankruptcy in September 2024 and announced more than 340 store closures nationwide, including two on Long Island, leaving landlords and shopping centers with large boxes to repurpose quickly when another chain sees a fit. Ross, which says it operates more than 1,800 stores nationwide, has been expanding steadily on Long Island as it builds out a regional footprint rather than relying on one-off openings.
That expansion has already shown its drawing power. Ross’s Hempstead debut pulled huge crowds, and its Farmingville opening also drew long lines, suggesting West Babylon could see a similar burst of shopper traffic when the doors open. For Suffolk County’s discount-shopping corridors, the move is another sign that national chains still see room for value retail where population density, parking access and price-sensitive shopping habits can support steady traffic.
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