Looking For a Space Might Be More Challenging Than I'd Hoped

Yesterday was just as busy as I thought it would be, with a few twists and turns in there just to make my life more interesting. *sigh* My car appointment went well - I dropped Minnion off and they had a new CX-5 waiting for me to drive off in - no charge. I liked it once I figured out how to work the CRT sound system and got it set to a general radio station that I could live with for a few hours. (I chose Minnesota Public Radio's Classical station - that's me in a nutshell - heavy metal in general, but a grounding in classical that I turn to as an 'always welcome' sound). I headed off to find my warehouse. 

I generally listen to Sirius XM's "Turbo" station in my car and 
on my phone. That's hard rock and it gets me moving on the 
treadmill and in general. But ... I couldn't access Sirius on 
the rental (without a lot of bother), so I went with an old 
favorite - public radio's classical music station. That's me in a 
nutshell - classical/hard rock. LOL

After getting lost in the warehouse district and using Google to get back to where I needed to be (which was actually REALLY easy to find *sigh*, I met with Mike. I explained what I was looking for, and that I had 48 metal shelving units alone that would need space, not counting any of my merchandise or standard displays. He said he didn't have anything large enough, but we walked to vies his largest unit - 2600 square feet. Yup. Not nearly large enough for my needs. He then passed along a card of a guy in Minneapolis who might be able to help. 

WareSpace was perfect in many ways, just not large 
enough. Their largest unit is 2500 square feet and I need 
more than that. They took a complex, completely revamped 
it, and made a lot of individual units for start-up businesses 
in it. It's a great concept and in many ways it worked 
for us, but not in size. *sigh* Back to hunting for that 
perfect space. 

My car was finished, so I drove the rental back and switched out a newly spark-plugged and fluid filled Minnion, happily waiting for me. She's purring now - LOL. On my way back home I decided to drop by Har Mar Mall. It's a mall that's actually in between work and my home. It was one of the first (if not the actual first) enclosed mall built in the state of Minnesota. But it's mostly vacant now. The larger tenants have moved to other locations in the area, and Marshall's is moving to their new space in our general area within a week or so. So there's LOTS of vacant space in the mall - perfect for a short-term lease and perfect situation for people in and out of our sale. 

Har Mar Mall, a strip mall located between the shop and my 
home, is basically a dead mall for interior shops now. Those 
stores with a strong exterior entrance - Michaels Arts and 
Crafts, Barnes & Nobel, Burlington Coat Factory, and some 
smaller restaurants, are doing great. They have regular 
business. But they don't have their back doors unlocked 
to access the larger Mall. It seems the Mall itself is mostly 
used by walkers these days, and there's nothing much 
sadder than a place that had been lively and active declining 
into old people walking their laps. 

Unfortunately, speaking with the property manager on-site, the mall isn't accepting any tenants at all right now - long or short term (I'd be looking at about 8 weeks for the rental contract). They're trying to get all of the permits in line to begin demolishing the mall next year. The City is fighting them on the grounds of a "historic" site, but I suspect the mall will win and will knock it down and rebuild something they think will work better in that space. That will cause Barnes & Nobel to have to move or close for a few months, which will make me very sad. But ... back to me (because of course, it's all about me - LOL), that doesn't solve my very real dilemma of finding approximately 4400 square feet of usable space in which to hold my clearance sale. I'll have to continue my hunt. 

I'm not counting anything out at this point in the process, 
but I do need to get something lined up in a reasonable 
period of time. It's too early to bounce this off DH just 
yet. He's stressed about cash flow and inventory. 

I did speak with the other guy - the Minneapolis property guy - who might be able to help. I'm hoping that might work through. I'd love to stay in my general area, but I also don't want to do anything farther south because we have a large problem with homeless and addicted people a bit south of our store's location and I don't need to be running a "Store Closing" sale in that environment. It's a pickle, to be sure. But at least I've started looking. Positive thoughts, as always, would be appreciated. I'm sure everything will fall into place, but I don't really need any additional anxiety in my life - LOL. So, I'm off to swim away some of this angst. Have an excellent Thursday and I'll be back tomorrow. Slava Ukraini.