A planned furniture store in East Grand Forks is, indeed, set to be a St. Michel Furniture outlet. Rob St. Michel, who owns St. Michel Furniture and jokingly described himself as the company’s “delivery guy,” indicated he plans to open the fifth such store in East Grand Forks by the end of 2021.
“It’s going to be us,” he told the Herald.
East Grand Forks City Council members on Tuesday approved a $149,999 loan to St. Michel Rental, a company that’s set to buy the former Shopko building near Gateway Drive to figuratively pave the way for the new Eastside location. The same company owns the land on which St. Michel’s Bemidji, Minn., location sits, and staff there plan to turn 30,000 square feet worth of the Eastside building into a St. Michel store and another 10,000 square feet into a yet-to-be-determined retail outlet.
Despite the identical names and the rental company’s position within a small constellation of firms linked to other St. Michel Furniture stores, Paul Gorte, East Grand Forks’ economic development director, said after Tuesday’s Council vote that St. Michel might try to open a higher-profile furniture store, perhaps with national profile, in East Grand Forks, rather than another that bears his name.
St. Michel on Thursday chalked that up to a miscommunication between himself and Gorte, claiming he hopes to get a nationally recognized business set up in the smaller, 10,000 foot segment of the store.
“That’s where there might have been a little confusion,” St. Michel said. “I may have miscommunicated with him on that.”
He declined to name the business he’s trying to lure into the smaller spot, and also declined to name the type of business it might be.
“It’s just too early,” St. Michel said.
The building itself was a Pamida store until 2012, when the company was subsumed by Shopko. The Shopko was one of several that closed in 2019. The St. Michel Furniture in Bemidji is a former Pamida building, as well. The company has outlets in Bottineau, Devils Lake, and Rugby, N.D.
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June 26, 2021 at 07:00PM
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St. Michel Furniture to open store in East Grand Forks - Grand Forks Herald
"furniture" - Google News
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