Badcock Home Furniture moving to renovated Airport Thruway building
The sign has yet to go up, but when it does the name Badcock Home Furniture & More will be atop an Airport Thruway building which once was home to retailer Circuit City, followed by a church.
Brad Stafford, the Dawson, Ga.-based Badcock dealer who owns the Columbus store, said Feb. 1 is the target date for opening the 21,800-square-foot furniture showroom at 3001 Airport Thruway. His other stores are in the Georgia communities of Albany, Americus, Cordele, Dawson and Sylvester.
“We’re excited about going there,” Stafford said Wednesday. “We had been trying to break into the real-estate market up here. I’ve got several locations, and this is the only one that I did not own. We wanted to find us a freestanding location. We looked at this one awhile back, and it had been on our radar. When the opportunity came up, we were able to negotiate a price on it.”
Muscogee County real-estate records show Stafford purchased the property from Raleigh, N.C.-based First-Citizens Bank & Trust Company on Oct. 20, paying $1.35 million. The commercial real-estate agent representing Stafford was Richard Mobley of Bickerstaff Parham, with Doug Jefcoat of W.C. Bradley representing the seller.
Stafford said he is closing the Badcock store at 3465 Macon Road following a moving sale to liquidate floor stock. He purchased the Columbus store in 2011 from Columbus businessman Mike Lee. It had been on Macon Road for more than a decade. Prior to that, there were two Badcock locations in the city, one downtown and another on Veterans Parkway.
“We’ve got a ton of inventory in there,” Stafford said of the liquidation sale for the move. “So we may keep it open with a skeleton crew, just depending on how much inventory is left. But it appears to be moving pretty quick.”
It has been 15 years since one-time electronics giant Circuit City vacated the Airport Thruway location for its move to Columbus Park Crossing on the city’s north side. The retailer of televisions, stereos and entertainment accessories had been in the market since 1986, relocating from the former Columbus Square Mall to Airport Thruway in 1992.
Circuit City left Airport Thruway in 2002 for Columbus Park, but the bankrupt chain announced in 2009 that all stores were being closed and inventory liquidated. Havertys Furniture moved into the Columbus Park Crossing space vacated by Circuit City in 2010 and has been there since.
Kingdom Metropolitan Worship Centre was the church that operated for several years at the Airport Thruway location. The structure, which had several rooms in it due to the church’s presence, has been gutted, Stafford said.
“We just had to open it up,” he said. “We went all the way back to the wall. There were still some Circuit City fixtures in there that the church had incorporated” into their worship center. The new store will have an updated interior and exterior look, with warmer tones than the Macon Road outlet, he said. There will be a prominent sign outside with an LED display that will stand out at night, he said.
The Badcock store is adjacent to Britt David Shopping Center, which is anchored by Walmart and Burlington Coat Factory. Home Depot is just around the corner. That should mean plenty of traffic for the home furnishings retailer, which will employ nine people and possibly more, depending on volume at the new location, Stafford said.
“It’s just a great, highly visible location,” he said. “Of course, Walmart’s a huge draw, and both of those shopping centers are in good shape and full up with tenants. I think we’re going to complement them and they’re certainly going to complement us.”
This story was originally published January 10, 2018 at 5:27 PM with the headline "Badcock Home Furniture moving to renovated Airport Thruway building."