St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist <A HREF="http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/busine ... >[b]Martin Van Der Werf[/b]</A> uncovered new rumors of a possible opening of an IKEA in St. Louis. Of course, IKEA denied the rumors and said their expansion plans are nearly finalized through 2008...



Martin Van Der Werf also reported that Ted Geiger is talking with building owners on Washington Avenue and in the Central West End about putting Java Plus in building lobbies. His first Java Plus opened in the Interco Tower at 101 South Hanley Road in Clayton. In addition to serving coffee, soft drinks, packaged sandwiches and snacks, Java Plus also serves salads from Geiger's Fuzio Universal Pasta franchise.

Opening a couple Java Plus' around the city would be cool. Hopefully he can work out some deals.



As for Ikea, I don't even want to try and speculate on anything there. I remember about a year ago there was a rumor that they may try to put one in St. Louis centre. That would be cool, but it just goes to show how unreliable rumors are. Hopefully it will come true one of these times.

Yes, I agree. There are a lot of rumors, some of which include a Borders and a GAP downtown.



You have the same optimistic outlook as James Sansone in Martin Van Der Werf's column -

Hopefully it will come true one of these times.

"We heard the rumors last week," said James Sansone, a principal with developer Sansone Group. "With them, the rumors come through about twice a year. One of these times, it's going to be true."

I can't see IKEA building a store in the city (it would be great however). A more realistic location would be somewhere in the Hwy. 40/Brentwood/Hanley area. Or worse, somewhere in west county.

The MSD site at Hampton and 44 would be a great location for IKEA.

I was looking for some old articles last night, and Ikea was actually mentioned as a store the city would like to see at the MSD site.

^that was me

Who knows? Idiot Tom Bauer is not in favor of redeveloping the MSD site - he would rather see St. Louis Marketplace be brought back to life. Unfortunately, even though St. Louis Marketplace is probably only a half mile (or less) from the MSD site, it is a horrible location that is difficult to access. IKEA would never locate there. St. Louis Marketplace should have never been built, especially with the horrible TIF deal that the city negotiated.



I would think that the city is becoming an easier sell to retailers these days. We're getting the new Target and now have PetsMart. The income is there, the people are there - I think it's just a matter of time before we start to attract some bigger retailers like Best Buy, Borders, etc.

you are so right about the market place on manchester. I remember when they built it and how it was vacant from the start. what a stereotypical city development. the original plan should have been just housing.

I was talking to my dad today about City developments and he mentioned that, in a presentation given by Rollin Stanley (sp?), urban planner for St. Louis City, there were discussions with the City to give up its Street Department site at Hampton and I-44 for the development of a new IKEA store. Interesting. Anyone hear anything about this?



By the way, my dad is Randy Mourning, assistant to the Building Commissioner for the City of St. Louis.

Interesting, I know they were planning on trying to bring some big name retailers into that area and make it a shopping complex. I thought they were looking for places like Borders, Best Buy, Circuit City, etc... at that site though. An IKEA would take up much, if not all, of the land available at that site. Still, that would be a HUGE pull for the city of St. Louis. I bet it would really help spark retail around that area. If they can find a better way to "connect" the St. Louis Marketplace development to where IKEA would be, they could probably turn that development full circle.

As reported in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch by columnist Martin Van Der Werf, IKEA denied the rumors and said their expansion plans are nearly finalized through 2008...

I hope this is finally taking shape. I would love not to have to drive to Chicago to get my IKEA fix.



BTW, I am glad we have a guy like Rollin Stanley on our team - this guy seems like a breath of fresh air. I hope he sticks around for a while!!

That would be awesome...



come on guys, catch up on your rumors, I had an unreliable source tell me in Oct about a STL Ikea.



http://www.kcskyscrapers.com/kcforum/vi ... php?t=4065

The Ikea rumor is nothing new... it has been circulating for a few years... and every year, it comes up again.

I'm was wondering why Ikea Ok, but Wal-mart is the devil? Ikea is even a bigger, uglier blue box than Walmart. If it's because Walmart is a cash cow, the CEO of Ikea may be the richest man in the world. In my opinion, they are similar in many respects: They both sell cheap sh*t, they both have gi-normous parking lots, and they both utilize ugly buildings. I personally have no problem with either retailer. I understand the arguments made against Walmart, and agree with many of them. Walmart should have urban stores with a more urban design. But overall, I think people overreact a bit with the criticism. I'm not trying to sound bitchy or anything. I'm just curious to read how you guys out there feel on this issue.

IKEA is more destination retail, people travel from STL to go to the one in Chicago.



Wal-mart is "close every mom and pop down and take over the world" retail.



Regardless of their urban design, if a wal-mart ever tried to come into the city i'd form the biggest angry mob you could find.

TheWayoftheArch wrote:Ikea doesn't have the reputation that walmart does. It doesn't compete with the average shop-it goes against the carol house, rothmans, famous-barrs. People who shop at Ambiente downtown want designer NAMES. They'll pay 17k for there bedroom set regardless. IKEA just lets us have some designer flavor at a reasonable price.

Why does it matter *who* the competition is? How is Carol House different that somebody's Mom & Pop joint? You think they'd have Brook Dubman on TV if they were a national chain ? IKEA gives you what you want for less. Wal-Mart gives you what you want for less.

TheWayoftheArch wrote:I don't know a single person who really hated walmart because of its lack of aesthetic appeal. They eliminate small retail. Exactly why olivette shot them down and they went to maplewood. They have the shadiest hiring practices out there also...

What do you consider shady hiring practices? They hire high schoolers and 60 year old people for $7-$10/hr jobs.



As for putting mom and pop out of business, it's a bit simple minded to pin that all on Walmart. They offer a decent product at a low price. That's no reason to cry foul. This is America. Should the playing field be leveled?



With regards to asthetics, municipalities have battled Walmart for years to try to build something a little more pleasing to the eye. I have a hard time believeing that nobody in this forum takes issue with Walmart's design.

Wal-mart may not be evil, but they are definitely not a good thing for the communities they set up shop in, especially smaller communities. Here are a few reasons Wal-mart is not a good civic citizen. They are one of the biggest sprawl contributors. They drive independant stores out of business. In smaller towns they can eliminate whole downtowns. They do not add to cities payrolls. Very often the jobs a new Wal-mart creates are zeroed out by the jobs that the city has lost because of the shops that have closed because of Wal-mart. Usually the jobs at Wal-mart are lower paying than the counterparts at the independant retailers. Wal-mart pays its average worker 8.23 an hour, that compared to a Grocery (Many of which Wal-mart's Supercenters are putting out of business) worker's average salary of 10.35 an hour. Finally the palying field should be evened out. For a company that is the largest and one of the most profitable in the world, why do we need to subsidize the construction of their stores? Why has Wal-mart received a TIF to build just about all their stores in the area? Mom and Pop on Main street don't get that tax break. I can probably save 5-10 dollars a week shopping at Wal-mart, but I cannot in good conscience do it.

mcarril wrote:Wal-mart pays its average worker 8.23 an hour, that compared to a Grocery...worker's average salary of 10.35 an hour.

Source?

The San Francisco Chronicle, 2/27/2004. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... 5224G1.DTL

Check out this article as well for more info on Wal-mart. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/co ... _mz001.htm

Good points. I totally agree about the TIFs. Walmart should not be subsidized. Nor should any other big retailer. I guess my point is that I don't see too much of a difference in Walmart, Target, Ikea, Kmart, Best Buy, etc., etc. It just seems like Walmart is the one that is always singled out. Thanks for the discussion.