By Carol L. Cole
Transcript Staff Writer

Hobby Lobby didn’t miss a beat last week when it moved a couple of miles west to the former Target location at 24th Avenue and West Main Street.

And they’ll celebrate with the store’s official grand opening this week and specials throughout the chain.

The new, improved and expanded Hobby Lobby closed at its old downtown location at 8 p.m. March 15 and opened at 9 a.m. March 16, doing a “soft opening” to help its workers get acclimated to the new store.

Hobby Lobby crews built new fixtures and replaced or painted every surface in the new 61,000-square-foot location — floors, ceiling tiles and walls.
“It’s much brighter and everything is shiny and new,” said Hobby Lobby store manager Rick Miller. “It’s like a new car, you know.”

About 30 people were brought in from all over the district to help with the move.
“We brought in the best we have in every department,” he said of the crew that helped them get the store merchandised.

Miller said it really went more smoothly than he expected.

“When we move a store, we’ll bring one of everything and lay it all out. And then we start bringing the rest of it and we try to maintain the other store while we’re doing that. So it’s kind of tough,” he said.

One of the strongest impressions a person gets when entering the new store is that it feels much larger, although the difference between the new location and the old one is only about 8,000 square feet.

“It’s really adequate for our needs here. And it gives us so much better vehicle than we had down the street. We were understored badly down there,” Miller said. “It’s not so much better selection, it’s just a better way of displaying it. There is more room for furniture. There is more room for home accents. There is more room for every department to spread out. And the jewelry department is bigger.”

Aisles are wider and there are twice as many tables on which to display merchandise.

“Now we have them all the way around the racetrack,” Miller said, of the loop that typically runs through the central part of a store.

The new store features a new concept being tried by the company, with stone on a portion of the facade, giving a more upscale appearance.

“I really like the front,” Miller said. “It’s a softer look than we had before. And the signs are a little bit different.”

It didn’t take the store’s loyal shoppers much time to find the new Hobby Lobby.
“It’s going to be a great store. It was already one of the top stores in sales. And it should do even better now that we’ve got the parking,” Miller said. “I thought that our greatest asset is the traffic on this corner is the best in town.”

He said they expect to get more store traffic from Interstate 35 at the new location, with the previous store drawing customers from as far away as Ada.

And in a few days, Mardel’s Christian and Educational Supply will open next door.
Miller said the Mardel’s location will be more upscale than its current locale.

“It’s going to be nice and bright and the colors are going to knock your socks off — purples and blues and reds on the walls. Really nice,” he said.

But even at Hobby Lobby’s old location, business had been steadily improving with the upswing in interest in crafting, hobbies and scrapbooking.

“I don’t see any stopping,” Miller said.

Hobby Lobby is open 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Saturday. It is closed Sundays.