SEQUIM — Proclaiming that Sequim is “exactly the right market for us,” Tacoma Goodwill Industries spokesman Matthew Erlich announced Monday that Sequim will see its own Goodwill store open in July.
The 32,000-square-foot former Rite Aid building in the Safeway shopping center at 680C W. Washington St. is the location, and the new store will mean about 30 new jobs, Erlich said.
Tacoma Goodwill, which already has 25 stores across Western and South-central Washington — including Port Angeles and Port Townsend — hires locally, Erlich said.
Company policy is to employ workers with disabilities or disadvantage; Goodwill also runs a program that helps older people return to the work force, he said.
To find out how to apply for a position at the Sequim Goodwill, visit www.TacomaGoodwill.org or phone 253-573-6500 and ask for the human resources department.
Erlich said the company is looking for a local person to serve as manager of the new store, as well as for donation attendants, cashiers and supervisors.
And though Goodwill stores operate at 603 S. Lincoln St. in Port Angeles and 602 Howard St. in Port Townsend — not to mention other thrift stores within Sequim — Erlich said there’s room for a used-clothing and used-housewares outlet to thrive.
Sequim has “families of all sorts needing to stretch their dollars. And if you’re retired, this is a great opportunity to find the things you need at a great value,” he said.
When considering a community for a new Goodwill, the company looks at home ownership, he added, since that’s a factor in how much “gently used” goods come in as donations.
Home ownership is “high, oddly enough, in Sequim,” Erlich said.
Goodwill also considers household income and employment, and those numbers make Sequim “everything we look for in a market,” he said.
Erlich cited the Sequim-Dungeness Valley Chamber of Commerce’s figure of $46,213 as the area’s median household income.
Unemployment was at 11 percent last month in Clallam County, and at 10.5 percent in Jefferson County.
At the same time, the Sequim area’s population is large enough to sustain the North Peninsula’s third Goodwill, he said.
“Our stores generally pull from a 10-mile radius,” and while Port Angeles’ radius encompasses 34,000 people, Sequim’s 10-mile spread includes another 31,000.
Port Townsend and environs have their own 31,000, Erlich added.
“Goodwill provides the community with a variety of services, and our stores are long-term investments,” Jane Taylor, president of Goodwill’s board of directors, said in a statement.
“In these tough economic times, Goodwill can help families and be a place for people to get that first job or second chance.”
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley Reporter Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.
