GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — Grand Rapids is getting ready to join the ranks of New York City, Chicago, Atlanta and Dallas in welcoming Michigan’s only Design Within Reach store.
The furniture retailer owned by West Michigan based MillerKnoll is moving into Breton Village mall, next to Spoke Cycling. Contractors could be heard working inside the space Thursday.
Design Within Reach is hiring for several positions within the store, its website shows. However, it’s unclear when the retailer will open. A sign posted on the storefront says “coming soon.”
Rob Forbes founded Design Within Reach in 1998 after realizing he couldn’t furnish his apartment with the same long-lasting furniture brands he’d come to love during his time in London, the company website says. Forbes and his team tried to fix this problem by buying 20 containers of furniture to sell by catalog.
Zeeland-based Herman Miller was one of the first companies to sign on with Design Within Reach.
“Within one year of launching, we were bringing the Eames Lounge Chair, Aeron Chair, and many other Herman Miller favorites directly to the retail customer – for the first time ever,” the Design Within Reach website states. However, Grand Rapids’ Design Quest was the first retailer to sell Herman Miller products beginning in 1990 before Design Within Reach was around, according to Design Quest co-owner Thor Sorensen.
Design Within Reach’s sales were slumping in 2009 when new leadership came in and bolstered the business by closing 30 stores and paring down the catalog to original brand furniture, according to Business of Home. Herman Miller, now known as MillerKnoll after last year’s $1.8 billion acquisition, bought the retailer in 2015.
Design Within Reach currently operates 34 stores, according to DWR public relations manager Dina Rosenberg. The closest location to Grand Rapids is about 180 miles away in Chicago.