Current mood:

hopeful

Can love keep Big Lots? Sequim residents hope store will stay



By Diane Urbani de la Paz, Peninsula Daily News


SEQUIM - When it comes to customer loyalty - no, make that love - this store's the envy of the retail universe.

"Big Lots, don't leave us," pleaded Austin Reeves, a retired architect also known as "the prayer lady," in an e-mail to the discount chain's customer care office in Columbus, Ohio.

Earlier this month, Big Lots corporate spokeswoman, Amy Stocker, said the Sequim store will close by mid-May.

The reason: poor performance.

One would never guess that from the fervor among devotees of the 7-year-old store.

The Big Lots of Bell Creek Plaza "is an incredible, affordable community resource," said Reeves, 59.

"When they get something new in, people call each other about it . . . it's a small community store, and we don't want to lose those community things."

Reeves recently hosted a wedding reception for her son and daughter-in-law in her home.

"It was elegant," she said, "and romantic."

It was also maybe $500 for the elaborate decorations.

"People asked, 'How did you do it?' and I said, 'I went to Big Lots.'"

"People shop there for so many different reasons," added Linda Lyon, another frequent shopper.

"It fills a certain slot . . . a lot of us are involved with community organizations involving children. It's a terrific place to get prizes and little gifts.

"And a lot of seniors aren't there for all those little fun items. They're doing their grocery shopping," she added.

So Lyon and Reeves got busy.

They urged friends, family and acquaintances to e-mail Big Lots' customer care office - at talk2US@BigLots.com - to call for a reprieve.

"Move, don't remove," wrote Reeves in an e-mail asking the company to consider "downsizing" its store to a smaller space.

Big Lots' Bell Creek Plaza store covers 22,000 square feet, according to manager Ade Weedman.

Big response
Big Lots' Matt Baker, recipient of those customer-care e-mails, called the flood one of the biggest responses he's seen since the chain began closing some 160 of its 1,400 U.S. stores.

How many messages came in from Sequim?

"A lot," was all Baker would say.

To Reeves' entreaty, he wrote: "I will forward your message to the Real Estate Department and believe me, we have talked to many of your co-citizens as well."

Stocker, however, did not return calls seeking comment for this article.

Yet Reeves is holding out hope.

She's a deaconess at Sequim Community Church, and organizer of a group that meets each Wednesday to pray for people suffering from illness, teens in trouble and other concerns.



Big Lots prayers
So has she prayed about Big Lots?

"Are you kidding? Of course I have been, first of all for the employees, for them to find work somewhere else, and also for the management at Big Lots, that they see the error in their ways."

The campaign to keep Big Lots, in a sense, exemplifies what Reeves likes about Sequim.

The workers are cheerful - and know exactly where to find everything, she said.

Reeves and her husband, Clark, moved here from Redmond 10 years ago.

"It's the first time in our lives we've had this kind of community with people."

Big Lots employees Lyne Tremlin and Cliff Silliman are already making plans for other work.

Silliman will probably increase his hours with Father & Son's, the Sequim lawn service he runs.

And Tremlin plans to open a business, though she's not quite ready to divulge what kind.

But in Big Lots' final seven weeks or so, life is likely to get harder for the 18-member staff.

The store has seen its last shipments of merchandise, Silliman said.

Customers are lamenting - in some cases, loudly - the impending loss.

"I hear a lot of people say, 'What am I going to do?'" Tremlin added.

She can only hope that, as shelves empty, customers don't take their frustration out on her.

"Go easy," she said.

Last modified: March 20. 2007 9:00PM



Well, I emailed my letter concerning the matter just a bit ago.

We've got roughly a month and a half until it shutters.