Exiting Nicollet, lock, stock, Crate & Barrel

Crate & Barrel is closing its downtown Minneapolis store after doing business on Nicollet Mall for more than 18 years.

A spokeswoman for the upscale contemporary home furnishings chain said Wednesday that the company wants to direct its attention to the new furniture store set to open in Edina's Galleria mall in mid-March.

The Galleria store, which eventually will be Minnesota's only Crate & Barrel, will be nearly three times as big as the downtown shop and will offer extensive furniture lines plus housewares and accessories.

"It's not that we're pulling out," said Bette Kahn, a spokeswoman with the Northbrook, Ill.-based chain. "We're building a much larger store than we can have in downtown Minneapolis, and it's got to be in a spot with lots of traffic."

The Jan. 27 closing won't offer any deeper discounts than the normal after-Christmas sales, Kahn said. Any unsold inventory will be moved to the Crate & Barrel in Southdale. That store also will close when the Galleria location opens.

Rumors had swirled for some time that Crate & Barrel would exit its downtown store, which it opened in the Young Quinlan Building at S. 9th Street and Nicollet Mall in 1989. Kahn said that the store was not losing money and that slowing sales didn't drive the decision to leave downtown.

Retail consultant Jim McComb said he wasn't surprised to hear about the store's closing. When Target opened across the street, McComb said that it was "great for downtown, but not so great for Crate & Barrel," which sells trendy and upscale housewares.

The Young Quinlan Building has a rich historical legacy, where women wearing white gloves still operate the elevators. Ann Wimmer, director of retail recruitment for the Minneapolis Downtown Council, said that "a few prospects were very interested" in the space, though she declined to be more specific.

J.B. Hudson is set to open in February on the corner of the Young Quinlan Building.

Crate & Barrel started in 1962 as a family business. It now has 160 stores in about 20 states, Kahn said. It opens about eight to 10 stores a year, and another Minnesota store is not in its two-year plans, she said.