Overhaul of the mall

MOSCOW - A new space is being created for Jo-Ann Fabric and Craft Stores on the east side of Old Navy at the Palouse Mall in Moscow.

When the fabric-and-craft store will occupy that space is unclear. Jo-Ann, which is currently located in another space at the shopping center, referred inquires to officials at the chain's corporate office, who didn't respond.

That change is one of several happening at the Palouse Mall. Macy's is closing, possibly March 20, after being an anchor tenant of the complex since 1979.

Alpine Vision Center is in the process of remodeling a space at the Palouse Mall and plans to relocate in the spring from its current location at a strip mall along Troy Highway in Moscow.

Sport Town is closing its location at the Moscow shopping center after being there for 36 years. It will continue online sales as well as sell athletic shoes, NFL sports team gear and clothing with university logos at stores in Spokane and Colfax.

•In October, the mall itself quietly changed hands. Palouse Mall LLC acquired it from Palouse Mall Associates LLC in Spokane, said Gerard Billington, real estate officer at the University of Idaho.

The mall and its leases, a former movie theater and a lease for the land where the Best Western University Inn stands, but not the hotel itself, were all part of the deal, Billington said.

The University of Idaho Board of Regents owns the land where those buildings are located. The mall was constructed by a developer in the 1970s and the company that owned it just before the sale was operated by his son and daughter, Billington said.

"It was 44 acres of pasture," he said of the mall property before it was developed.

Nicholas Echelbarger is the president of Palouse Mall LLC., based in Edmonds, Wash., according to public records filed with the Idaho Secretary of States office.

The company's location matches more than one business listed with the Echelbarger name at the Washington Secretary of State's Office.

The Echelbargers run a real estate investment company, according to an Aug. 1, 2014, article in The Herald Business Journal based in Everett, Wash.

One of the family's projects was revamping a rundown shopping center that had been home to a Safeway grocery store in an under-utilized section of Edmonds between the downtown and the waterfront, according to the article. Attempts by the Tribune to reach the Echelbargers were not successful.

Palouse Mall tenants are watching closely. Todd Green, owner of VGH Computer Service, is confident that mall management, which didn't change when Palouse Mall LLC took over, will find a successor for Macy's relatively soon.

That happened when another anchor tenant, the Emporium, left in 2003. Within about a year, spaces were being renovated for its replacements, Old Navy and Bed Bath and Beyond, Green said.

Dr. Nathan Wilson, an owner of Alpine Vision, shares Green's optimism. He said the mall should be an excellent place for he and his wife, Dr. Julia Polito, also an optometrist, to expand their business.

Alpine Vision's Moscow and Lewiston locations have grown by about 300 percent since they acquired them in 2011, Wilson said.

To better serve patients, the Moscow office will go from one to four patient lanes and 1,500-square-feet to 4,000-square-feet as it adds hours for its third provider, Dr. Stacie Zollman, Wilson said.

Doing so at the mall makes sense because a large share of the increase came from Alpine Vision becoming an in-network provider for Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories, Wilson said.

The mall is close to Pullman where SEL has its headquarters and also the home of Washington State University, another place where many of the practice's patients come from.

"We wanted to be centrally located and serve both communities," Wilson said.

Unlike Alpine Vision, Sport Town's business model no longer fits with the mall, said owner Steve Warwick.

His lease expires at the end of May, and mall management wants the space to be a part of a new location for Jo-Ann Fabric. He was asked to move to a spot at the mall that formerly housed Hallmark. It is a smaller, more expensive slot that gets more foot traffic, Warwick said. That request came about the same time he learned that Nike was going to start selling some of its elite products directly to consumers from its website.

Closing in Moscow will allow him to focus more on online sales through teamstores.com and Amazon.com as well as venues in Spokane and Colfax. The business operates out of two Main Street buildings in Colfax that together have 36,000 square feet of space. Colfax's low real estate prices make that venture possible, Warwick said.

What's happening to Warwick is also occurring at other businesses. VGH Computer Service has evolved at least three times since becoming a Palouse Mall tenant 23 years ago, Green said.

He started as a Video Game Headquarters and exited that business in 1999 in favor of computer repair, becoming a certified Apple service provider four years ago.

The business strategy he's following makes it so he's not dependent on foot traffic and has survived the departure of other anchor tenants at the mall. His store is a destination for customers who need a specific component or have a broken iPhone, MacBook or iPad.

Stores are plotting how to survive in an era when many consumers prefer to shop by pointing and clicking on their computers or smartphones, Green said.

His store used to sell Microsoft software that the company now rents to consumers. He sees something similar with Beats headphones, which are a part of Apple. He sells them and does repairs, but most of the headphones he fixes were purchased elsewhere.

"It's how long can you stay relevant with more and more companies going directly to the customer," Green said.

Williams may be contacted at ewilliam@lmtribune.com or (208) 848-2261.