PORT ANGELES — The former Gottschalks building may never again house a department store.
All efforts to recruit a department store or other major retailer to replace Gottschalks, which closed May 30, appear to have been exhausted — that is, at least until the recession is over, say members of the K.O. Erickson Trust, which owns the building at 200 W. First St..
The trust is considering revamping the 34,900-square-foot structure to attract other types of tenants and has hired a Portland, Ore., architect to determine how that could be done.
“We’re talking with an architect,” said Pat Hyden, trust secretary and treasurer, “and he’s going to present us with some options. And hopefully, we can find something that is viable.”
David Storm, managing trustee, admits that changing the layout of the building to cater to other businesses likely would prohibit the location from being used as a department store in the future.
“That’s why we are moving very slowly,” he said, emphasizing that no final decision has been made.
The building has housed three department stores — People’s, Lamonts and Gottschalks — since 1954, ensuring that downtown Port Angeles had a large department store as an anchor business.
No offers
Storm and Hyden said the trust has had no offers on leasing the building since Gottschalks announced bankruptcy in January.
The architect, Frank Schmidt, will provide a “walk through” with some preliminary sketches for the trust’s board of directors on what can be done with the building at its Sept. 9 meeting, said Dan Gase, the trust’s Realtor.
“He’s pretty up on what kind of stuff they need,” he said.
Gase said he met Schmidt at an International Council of Shopping Centers event July 30-31 in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, and recommended him to the trust.
He said Schmidt’s services are needed because department stores and the other major retail chains have cut back growth nationwide because of the recession.
“I’ve contacted just about every main retailer that you could think of: Kohls, Ross, Penneys,” Gase said. “Just go down that whole list. There are dozens of them.
“So many of them right now are in such an economic mode, they look at closing stores rather than moving into uncharted territory.”
Not attractive, at least now
Gase and Hyden both said Port Angeles doesn’t have enough residents or an average income high enough to attract big retailers during a recession.
“Most of the retail stores that are in large malls have a certain set of parameters,” Hyden said, referring to population and income.
“You can’t adapt your building to meet those kind of parameters.”
While the trust has not received any offers, a grocery chain was interested enough to send a representative from San Francisco to look at the building about three weeks ago, Gase said.
That company, Grocery Outlet, decided the parking was not as accessible as it would want for its customers, he said.
“They tried to visualize a little old lady with a cart full of groceries going to her car,” Gase said.
Access to parking is one of the issues that the architect will address, he said.
Gaes said he also will spend three days next week visiting towns in eastern Washington to see what they have done to fill vacant buildings of similar sizes.
Closure of Gottschalks lowered sales tax revenue for the city of Port Angeles.
In April, after a group of liquidators purchased the Gottschalks chain in an auction, Linda Rotmark, Clallam County Economic Development Council director, described the loss of the Port Angeles store as a “triple whammy.”
“Not only are we losing a business, but an anchor business in downtown Port Angeles, but also an anchor business in downtown Port Angeles that is owned by a trust fund that gives money to nonprofits,” Rotmark said.
The trust used its lease revenue from Gottschalks to contribute funds to five local charities — Port Angeles Boy Scouts and Girls Scouts, Port Angeles Salvation Army, Olympic Peninsula Chapter of the Red Cross and the Clallam County Family YMCA. It does the same with its lease revenue from tenants at 102 and 104 E. First St.
“We need to try and figure out some next steps,” Rotmark said in April, “because we truly can’t have that building sitting there empty.”
________
Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.
