A worker finishes installing the Party City sign Sept. 14 in Fairplain Plaza. Party City is slated to open its new location Friday. (Tony Wittkowski | HP Staff)
By Tony Wittkowski | Business Reporter | The Herald-Palladium
BENTON TOWNSHIP — A new Party City will open in Fairplain Plaza by the end of the week.
Patricia Mahony, vice president of construction for Mid-America Asset Management, said store officials have a tentative opening date Friday. Mid-America Asset Management is the corporate office that owns Fairplain Plaza in Benton Township and leases spaces to businesses.
“We turned the place over to them, and they have been stocking and updating fixtures,” Mahony said. “We’ve been working on this for well over a year now. Mid-America has an office in Michigan where our brokers were seeking tenants in Fairplain Plaza.”
Continental Construction of Portage, Mich., began working on site this summer to prepare for Party City’s transition into the allotted space. Mahony said Continental Construction does the majority of the work at Fairplain Plaza. The store’s multi-colored sign was installed above the business’ threshold early last week.
Benton Township Director of Inspections Tom Baldwin said he issued a certificate of occupancy last week to Party City officials.
“They’ve been stocking the store for the past week,” he said. “Party City is moving from the old Kmart facility by Applebee’s off of Pipestone to Fairplain Plaza south where the Old Navy store used to be.”
Baldwin said work began in June at 1599 Mall Drive in the 6,500-square-foot space.
The Zimmerman Agency, which handles all media requests for Party City franchises and affiliates did not return calls.
Party City stores are known as a one-stop shopping destination for party supplies, balloons and costumes. Party City Holdco Inc. is the leading party goods retailer in North America.
Party City Holdco Inc. designs, builds and distributes party goods, including paper and plastic tableware, metallic and latex balloons, Halloween and other costumes, accessories, novelties, gifts and stationery throughout the world.
The company’s retail operations include more than 900 specialty retail party supply stores in the United States, Mexico and Canada, operating under the names Party City and Halloween City, and e-commerce websites through the domain name PartyCity.com.
Contact Tony Wittkowski at twittkowski@TheHP.com or (269) 932-0358. Follow him on Twitter: @tonywittkowski.
(Author’s Note: This article was originally published on Sept. 23, 2015)
Tony Wittkowski 