WINCHESTER — Ollie’s Bargain Outlet, a Harrisburg, Pa.-based surplus merchandise retail chain, plans to open a Winchester location in the former Toys R Us building at 655 E. Jubal Early Drive.
Jerry Altland, vice president of real estate for Ollie’s, said on Monday that the store will open in March and employ 45 to 55 full and part-time employees.
Founded in 1982 by the late Morton Bernstein, Ollie’s Bargain Outlet sells items obtained from closeouts, buyouts and overstock sales, according to the company website, which says Ollie’s is the place to “Get Good Stuff Cheap!” The national chain has 303 locations in 22 states. The closest store to Winchester is in Harrisonburg.
“We always wanted to be in Winchester,” Altland said. “We just never had been able to find the right spot.”
A “coming soon” sign for Ollie’s Bargain Outlet now hangs in the window of the shuttered toy store, which closed in June as part of a company-wide liquidation. Toys R Us had occupied the 31,107-square-foot building since its construction in 1994. The sign encourages people to apply for jobs at ollies.us.
Altland said Ollie’s purchased the property at a Toys R Us auction in New York City. He declined to give the purchase price. “Fortunately, we got it.”
According to Winchester tax records, the building and 6.3-acre parcel on which it sits has an assessed value of $3,589,700. The site was sold to Ollie’s on Oct. 25. A sale price is not listed.
As of Monday, Ollie’s had not applied for a building permit with the city to make any changes to the structure.
(4) comments
Actually, Ollie's has some decent items and is a step above other outlets.It's better to have the former store being utilized for commerce than vacant and I'm guessing it will be successful. However, to correct the article, the closest Ollie's to Winchester isn't in Harrisonburg, but rather, Hagerstown. And, specifically, there's four other Ollie's Outlet locations closer to Winchester than Harrisonburg based upon Ollie's own store locator.
"The sign encourages people to apply for jobs at ollie.us."
The correct link is "ollies.us".
Yep, let's just have a vacant building with a parking lot sprouting weeds.
Great. Another bargain outlet for the area. Another place selling someone else's unwanted junk here. Yeah, that's the right kind of business model we want...NOT![thumbdown][angry][censored]
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