Exclusive: Pirch NorthPark Center to be De-Perched This Month

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Sources tell me that the California-based mega high end appliance and “try before you buy” plumbing showroom Pirch at NorthPark Center will be shutting its doors at the end of this month. Due to a massive corporate re-structuring, all six Pirch locations outside of California will close. The four California locations will remain open for business as usual with the full support of L. Catterton, their private equity firm, who seeded the company’s rapid expansion into ten other locations, four outside of the Golden state. 

Pirch has been named on Forbes’ list of America’s Most Promising Companies twice, dipping down to number 32 the year they opened in Dallas. The company has also cleaned house on awards for visual presentation and in-store communications from the Association of Retail Environments.

Their homilies — “Live joyfully,” “Your first decision of the day is the most important,” “Choose happiness” — have been the “the soul of Pirch,” as Connie Dufner reported when the Dallas store first opened: 

A washer-dryer isn’t just a washer-dryer,” says (CEO Jeffery) Sears. “It’s the caretaker of a child’s first blanket. That tub represents 45 minutes of sanity for a working mom. That oven baked the chocolate chip cookie with a gooey smear on a baby’s face.” (Oh stop, Mr. Sears! You had us at “Hello, may we get you a beverage?”) Have a great experience, try before you buy and eventually you will buy…

Well, maybe not.

In a meeting this morning, Dallas PIRCH employees were informed that the company is closing its Dallas showroom. The company’s warehouse north of LBJ will close in November. And the newly opened Austin store at the Domain, unveiled in May, is also closing.

It will be interesting to know what NorthPark Mall will do to fill the huge 35,000 square foot space the high end appliance showroom has occupied since August of 2014.

There is no word, however, on whether the company will be changing any of those perky slogans, as they exit six markets.

PIRCH Dallas Opening
Dallas, TX
©2014 Darin Fong Photography

 

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Candy Evans, founder and publisher of CandysDirt.com, is one of the nation’s leading real estate reporters.

11 Comments

  1. Joanna England on September 11, 2017 at 3:29 pm

    I think Jon Anderson will be the most sad among its visitors.

    • Jon Anderson on September 13, 2017 at 7:08 am

      I’m not shocked. Remember The Great Indoors (Sears) and Expo (Home Depot) that tried the same concept of high-end appliances and fixtures? They both eventually died too. I think part of the problem was that the lifecycle of buyers was too long to keep traffic up in such a pricey retail space. I mean how often do you need a faucet or fridge? (If only Apple made them we’d be changing them every year.)
      .
      …and Jon will be there for the fixture sale!

      • Joanna England on September 13, 2017 at 11:40 am

        Of course you will!

  2. The_Overdog on September 11, 2017 at 5:02 pm

    Man, between building a 35,000 sq ft store for bathroom fixtures in NorthPark Mall and Taco Cabana building like 50 Pollo Tropical stores and shuttering them all in like 2 years, the biggest boneheaded business decision for 2017 is going to be a real competition. But there is still time.

  3. Fred Sheldon on September 12, 2017 at 9:01 am

    Great concept, but I’m not sure Americans are going to take a shower in a store at the mall.
    Consumers want value…the best bang for the buck…

  4. Cody Farris on September 12, 2017 at 1:44 pm

    The following statement is telling: “And the newly opened Austin store at the Domain, unveiled in May, is also closing.” How do you go from opening a store in May only to close it months later? Regardless, all of this is too bad, because I have clients who have told me how much they loved the concept, and because brick and mortar is struggling everywhere.

    • Candy Evans on September 13, 2017 at 2:24 am

      “brick and mortar is struggling everywhere.” SO true!

    • Jon Anderson on September 13, 2017 at 7:10 am

      It smells of their VC funding drying-up that resulted in the hasty plug-pulling. In the end the remaining California stores will likely die as well.

      • Wayne E Small on September 14, 2017 at 4:05 pm

        You are so right. This is just the first step, the next will be closing one or more of the stores in California and then the others will go, too.

  5. Ed Murchison on September 12, 2017 at 6:50 pm

    Sad to see it go…but not surprised.

  6. Jonathan S on September 15, 2017 at 10:44 pm

    I think that there was more than just business being bad, seems like there was something shady going on internally. If Jeffrey was pushed put as CEO a few months back that tells something was not up to par.

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