Treebird Market has terminated its lease agreement for the old Hood River News building and is instead making investments in its current location, 106 Highway 35 in Hood River. Treebird is a full-service grocery store featuring local and organic food.
Treebird Market has terminated its lease agreement for the old Hood River News building and is instead making investments in its current location, 106 Highway 35 in Hood River. Treebird is a full-service grocery store featuring local and organic food.
HOOD RIVER — Treebird Market has opted to make key investments to its current store while working to increase capacity instead of moving to a new location, Michael Kelly, president, has announced.
In 2021, Treebird revealed plans to expand into the old Hood River News building on State Street. Almost two years later on June 21, Treebird signed a mutual lease termination agreement with Eagle Newspapers, owners of the building.
“The building needed a lot of work after being a newspaper for decades and then sitting vacant for several years,” Kelly said in a press release. “Electrical and plumbing were some of the big ticket items needing major overhauls, along with the requirements from the city as part of the change of use such as extensive ADA upgrades and street work and all of these improvement costs were landing on Treebird as a tenant.
Treebird Market had planned to move into a bigger location but is now looking to improve its current site.
Carl Zoch photo
“With those items, Treebird was looking at more than $1 million in cost just in the real estate capital improvements, not to mention the needed equipment, inventory, and operating costs for a much larger market,” he said.
Kelly said Treebird and Eagle could not come to an agreement on those improvements.
Treebird is now planning to make some key investments in their current store, located at 106 Highway 35 in Hood River (near Tum-A-Lum).
“Treebird Market is growing with amazing community support and now has a much clearer picture of what sustainable growth means and will start with focusing back on the current store and strengthening team operations,” Kelly said. “Treebird is looking at several options for longer term growth to serve the Gorge community of producers and consumers over the next few years for decades to come.”
Barrett Smith, vice president, Eagle Newspapers, and managing partner, EPIP, said Eagle is looking into options to develop the old Hood River News site.
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