On October 1958, Henry Sy, Sr. opened the first Shoemart store, as SM then was called, along Rizal Avenue in downtown Manila. The company expanded its shoe store chain in the 1960s. It was one of the pioneers in the new urban centers when it opened bigger shoe outlets in the Makati Commercial Center in 1963, and in Cubao in 1967. In the 1970s, the shoe store shifted to a full department store and emerged as a key player in the shopping center industry in the 1980s.