IKEA proposes replacement of Renton WA store

[Brian Lutz]

http://www.ikea.com/us/en/about_ikea/ne ... ttle_store

The IKEA store in Renton is a bit unusal in the fact that it was originally built into an existing warehouse when it was opened in 1994. Over the years they've gone from using half the warehouse as a store and the other half as a parking lot, to filling most of the warehouse with the store and using a separate warehousenext door as the parking area for the store. Under the proposal they're making now, they want to tear down the parking structure and build a two-story purpose built store there (of roughly the same 400,000 square foot size of the existing store, eventually tearing down the existing store to use as the parking lot for the new store. Assuming they get the appropriate approvals, they plan to have the new store open by the end of 2016.

[Alpha8472]

IKEA is a company with lots of money. If they want to spend tons of money on a brand new store, then that is up to them. A brand new store will attract new customers and bring in more business. It is not just about the customer side of the store. There was probably a lack of space for freight in the storage areas of the store. A store cannot be successful if it does not have a place to put all of the merchandise that it needs to stock the floor. Running out of stock on the sales floor is what can kill a store. Just look at Walmart. They are constantly running out of stock on the sales floor for whatever reason. Some stores simply don't have enough room in the backrooms to store enough merchandise. Others are too cheap to hire enough employees to stock the shelves. Others have a combination of both problems.

IKEA knows how to run a business and they are very successful and popular unlike other stores such as Walmart that are too cheap to bother to maintain or replace their old stores.

[Jeff]

All IKEA replacement stores in the LA area have moved locations completely.

Tustin IKEA was a small location that was moved to Costa Mesa, about 8 miles away. The original store was small at 150k feet.

City Of Industry IKEA was moved about 5 miles north to Covina. This was an original STOR location and was large but not large enough. The Covina store site has the parking under the store for the most part and was the site of a former Montgomery Ward.

Burbank IKEA is moving 3 miles down the street to a new larger store.

Fontana IKEA is the only IKEA store I know that was closed down due to lack of business.

Carson IKEA is the only store left that is original. It is a former Broadway department store. You enter and go up escalators to the third floor and then make your way down to the first. They added a warehouse area next door and this is small. Can't be more than 240k feet.

[Brian Lutz]

In this case, if they want to build a new store it makes sense for them to just stay where they are since they have plenty of space already. The plan is to keep the existing store operating while the new one is being built, but parking is already troublesome enough as is, I can't imagine what it would be like when they remove 75% of the parking spots to build the new store.