J. Crew to open second outlet store in Wyndhurst

By: Bryan Gentry | New Era Progress
Published: July 21, 2009

J. Crew is converting an empty storefront in Wyndhurst into its second outlet store in Lynchburg.

The additional shop is just a few miles and less than a 10-minute drive from J. Crew’s current store in Lynchburg, but it will give the clothing retailer more space and greater visibility, said manager Erika Kerns.

The store is slated to open in August in the shop that used to be Hiker’s Outpost. The existing J. Crew clearance store will remain open.

Kerns said that the current clearance store has been successful, but it has had its challenges, too.

“We definitely have more merchandise that we want to be able to sell to our customers,” she said. “Currently we just don’t have the space to put the merchandise out.”

The New York-based company’s clearance store is packed into a corner of J. Crew’s distribution center on Millrace Drive, in the Lynchburg Center for Industry off of Graves Mill Road. Expanding the store was not an option because the distribution center needs the space.

The location also presented the challenge of the store being difficult to find, being off of any main thoroughfare.

Kerns said the company decided in May to open a second store. In June it signed a lease for the location in Wyndhurst, a 2,500 square-foot building. Hiker’s Outpost had left that location empty when it closed in April.

Kerns said that the building’s size and layout fit J. Crew’s specifications well. Also, the location could catch the eyes of more potential customers, she said. Enterprise Drive is a popular route not only for accessing the Wyndhurst community but also for connecting U.S. 221 to Timberlake Road.

The company has hung posters in the shop’s windows advertising its opening. “We’re doing construction, putting in flooring, making sure that it looks … as close to a J. Crew retail store as possible,” Kerns said.

It will be called the J. Crew Wyndhurst Clearance Store, while the current location will retain the name J. Crew Millrace Clearance Store, Kerns said.

The current store has about eight employees, and J. Crew plans to hire a full staff of about the same size for the new store, she said.

J. Crew employs about 700 people in the Lynchburg area at its call center and distribution center.

The company’s stock closed at $28.12, up 58 cents, on the New York Stock Exchange on Monday.