Vancouver’s Big Kmart store will close in February, as recessionary pressures continue to hammer area retailers.
Corporate officials Friday confirmed the store, which employs 68 people, will close Feb. 14. Kim Freely, a spokeswoman for Sears Holdings Corp. in Illinois, which owns Kmart, said the tough economy played a role in the decision.
The Kmart at 2711 N.E. Andresen Road was among the first national discount retailers to bring a store to Clark county when it opened in 1975. Hordes of shoppers crowded its aisles looking for “Blue Light Specials.” Since then, new retail developments have siphoned away business.
“There are many factors that go into these decisions as a normal course of business,” Freely said.
After 35 years of operation, “it’s always a loss to the community when you lose a national retailer like Kmart,” said Pam Lindloff, a retail real estate specialist and associate vice president of NAI Norris Beggs & Simpson’s Vancouver office.
A recent list of local store closures includes Joe’s outdoor store, Steve & Barry’s apparel, the Fisher’s Land Albertsons store, Best Buy and Koplan’s Home Furnishings in Vancouver, along with Linens ’N Things and Circuit City at Jantzen Beach SuperCenter.
Lindloff linked Kmart’s closure to competition from Walmart Stores Inc., which now operates three stores in Vancouver and plans others in Salmon Creek, Woodland and elsewhere.
“I’m sure Walmart stores have been fortunate enough to draw some Kmart customers,” she said.
However, Lindloff said certain shoppers continue to rely on Kmart as a retail destination.
“It’s sad. I think there is a place in the market for them,” Lindloff said.
A liquidation sale is set to start Dec. 17 at Vancouver’s 84,184-square-foot Big Kmart, Freely said.
Opening day party
The store opened on Feb. 28, 1975, an exciting day for longtime Vancouver resident Kathy Huss.
“I was thrilled to death and it was so fascinating,” said Huss, now in her 60s and c hairwoman the Ogden Neighborhood where Kmart is located.
According to Columbian archives, the opening drew thousands of shoppers to the retailer’s novel, mega discount-store model.
“The first time I experienced the Blue Light Special was amazing,” said Huss, who remembered she purchased two sets of pillow cases at the flashing light sale.
Kmart’s early marketing campaigns convinced shoppers the chain could not be undersold, said Deborah Ewing, a retail expert and vice president of Eric Fuller & Associates Inc. in Vancouver.
“Kmart was the poster child for discount stores,” Ewing said, adding that the Vancouver store site was once a central location.
“That was back before the I-205 bridge was built, when 164th Avenue was a two-lane road,” Ewing said.
Kmart has not renewed its lease for the store’s building, said Tim Brown a Vancouver-based commercial real estate broker who represents owners of Kmart’s 10-acre site, the Parker family in Ridgefield. Brown said another company owns the actual building.
“Kmart renews its lease every five years,” Brown said.
Vancouver property owner Ron Keil said he has made several attempts to purchase the Kmart site to add to his nearby land holdings. Keil is a longtime Vancouver businessman, former grocery store owner and owner of the Fourth Plain Center shopping complex north of Kmart.
Keil said he is not surprised by Kmart’s plans to close the Vancouver store.
“Retailers are scaling back. It’s not that unusual,” he said.
Keil speculated that weaker sales at the Vancouver Sears store, within two miles of Kmart, may have affected the corporate decision to close the Kmart store.
The Hoffman Estates, Ill.-based discount chain acquired Sears in 2005. After the merger, certain Kmart stores started carrying Sears merchandise, such as Craftsman tools and Kenmore appliances.
Freely said the Vancouver Kmart store closure is not part of a larger trend, but one of five stores planned for closure.
“We are closing a handful of locations,” including two stores in Michigan, one store in Indiana and one in Kentucky, Freely said.
In 2002, Kmart closed more than 300 stores in the United States and laid off around 34,000 workers after the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
Vancouver’s Huff said she will miss the local Kmart, although she doesn’t shop at the store very often anymore.
“It was sad to see it slowly decline, both in product and quality. I hope something as good or better comes in to take its place,” she said.
