July 2, 1999

Office Depot takes Future Shop space

By MARC STILES
Journal Real Estate editor

Office Depot apparently has not decided on the location of its new Seattle store, but it does have a new distribution center in the Northwest.

The expanding company, which says it's the world's largest seller of office products, has sublet Future Shop's 283,000-square foot Building W 3/4 in Kent North Corporate Park from Future Shop. Future Shop, a Canadian company, closed its U.S. stores earlier this year.

Size-wise the deal is among the largest, if not the biggest, transaction this year in the warehouse-studded Kent Valley.

Al Robertson, a broker for the commercial real estate services firm of Kidder, Mathews & Segner, represented Future Shop in the deal. He said the space sat empty for only about four weeks. The valley's tight industrial vacancy rate and some good luck helped seal the deal, said Robertson. Cushman & Wakefield brokers Brad Knowles of Seattle and Mike Sidney of Los Angeles represented Office Depot.

The valley's industrial vacancy rate dropped a full point to 5.3 percent, according to Cushman & Wakefield's preliminary second quarter report.

As part of the deal, Office Depot will sub-sublet 117,000 square feet to Holman Distribution, which is currently subletting the space from Future Shop.

The California State Teachers' and Public Employees' Retirement systems own the business park.

Office Depot operates 779 stores in the U.S., Canada, France and Japan. Of those, 22 are in Washington state. The company has said it wants to open at least one more Seattle-area store and retail brokers say the chain reportedly is eyeing the prime, 25,000-square-foot downtown Seattle location now occupied by Loehmann's, a clothing retailer, at 1423 Fourth Ave.

An Office Depot spokesperson did not return a telephone inquiry. Any talk of Office Depot taking the Loehmann's space, however, may be moot. A clerk at the Fourth Avenue outlet said there are no plans to close that particular store.