After nine years in the Hallmark greeting card business at the Nugget Mall, owner Marilyn Molburg is calling it quits.<\/p>\n
Since last Monday, everything at Holly\u2019s Hallmark in the Nugget Mall has been discounted 20 percent in a going-out-of-business sale. This week, everything is 30 percent off, and Molburg said discounts will continue to drop.<\/p>\n
Molburg said business started declining when Nugget Alaskan Outfitter moved from the mall to the Mendenhall Mall in 2013. It continued to worsen when Rodfather\u2019s Broiler Restaurant and Specs in the City did the same in 2014.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt certainly has not helped to have businesses leave that helped to bring foot traffic,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome stores are going to close,\u201d said Terri Gordon, property manager for the Nugget Mall, which is owned by Loveless\/Tollefson Properties of Redmond, Washington. \u201cThey\u2019ve had some tough economy there, but we\u2019ve got some big stores coming in and it\u2019s going to help everybody in the long run, and if some of the older tenants have to turn over, we\u2019re sad to see them go, but that happens and we\u2019ll find replacements.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gordon said Sportsman\u2019s Warehouse and Papa John\u2019s Pizza are moving into the Nugget Mall complex and could open as soon as June. Both businesses have signed contracts, she said.<\/p>\n
Sportman\u2019s Warehouse will be located next to OfficeMax and have two entrances \u2014 one leading to the parking lot and one leading to the mall. Papa John\u2019s will be in the Nugget Mall annex, an adjacent building, next to Chez Alaska Cooking School.<\/p>\n
With Holly\u2019s Hallmark closing, that\u2019ll mean about eight empty storefronts. Gordon anticipates Sportsman\u2019s Warehouse will bring in new tenants. She said Loveless\/Tollefson Properties had an appraisal done last year and is in the process of bringing leases up to market value.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re trying to make the mall stronger and support itself and with that some weeding may occur of people\u2019s own decision,\u201d Gordon said.<\/p>\n
Molburg has been trying to sell the Hallmark store for almost two years.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am very sad about closing,\u201d Molburg said. \u201cPeople love Hallmark and this is the last one in Southeast.\u201d<\/p>\n
Holly\u2019s Hallmark (Molburg named the store after her daughter) originally went on sale for $30,000, plus the price of inventory. Molburg dropped it to $65,000 for everything.<\/p>\n
\u201cI still just keep praying somebody will walk up to me and say, \u2018Hey, for everything you\u2019ve got, you take this much money.\u2019 It just pains me to have it closed,\u201d Molburg said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
One of the store\u2019s top sellers were the Hallmark Christmas ornaments.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople are just going to be heartsick that they\u2019re not going to get their ornaments in town anymore. It\u2019s unimaginable how many people bought Hallmark ornaments,\u201d Molburg said.<\/p>\n
Other popular items included Yankee Candle products, Willow Tree angel figurines, gift wrapping, party ware and, of course, Hallmark greeting cards.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery day, that was the bread and butter of the business,\u201d Molburg said.<\/p>\n
Molburg would like to close by April 1. She\u2019s on a month-to-month lease with Loveless\/Tollefson Properties. Molburg employs two full-time and one part-time worker at the store. Besides owning the Hallmark, Molburg works for the Department of Labor in the unemployment call center.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Prior to taking over the Hallmark in 2007, Molburg owned another gift store in the Nugget Mall, Sentiments, across from Rodfather\u2019s Broiler for 10 years. She also ran a Hallmark specialty section at a store she owned in Haines. She\u2019s been in business for herself since 1988.<\/p>\n
Molburg started to cry as she talked about closing Holly\u2019s Hallmark. But, she said, it\u2019s time.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m 60,\u201d she said. \u201cI want to spend more time with my kids and grandkids. I just can\u2019t keep hanging on anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
After nine years in the Hallmark greeting card business<\/a> at the Nugget Mall, owner Marilyn Molburg is calling it quits. Since last Monday, everything at Holly\u2019s Hallmark in the Nugget Mall has been discounted 20 percent in a going-out-of-business sale. This week, everything is 30 percent off, and Molburg said discounts will continue to drop. … Continue reading Hallmark store could close as soon as April<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":15966,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[75],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-15965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15965"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=15965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}