Plans for a new Duluth office building that will house the headquarters of women’s clothing retailer Maurices have reportedly been scaled back.
In a recent in-depth feature story examining economic development in Duluth, Twin Cities Business reported that Maurices employs more than 400 in Duluth and plans to add roughly 150 workers once it moves into a new downtown headquarters on Superior Street.
The building plans, however, have been downsized, according to a Duluth News Tribune report. Instead of 15 stories, it will be 10 to 12, and the attached parking ramp will have 500 spaces instead of 600, the newspaper reported. Groundbreaking, meanwhile, has been pushed back from December to spring, and completion is now slated for December 2015.
The downsizing is reportedly expected to trim the project’s cost from $80 million to $70 million—but Maurices, which will own the building, actually plans to pay $50 million, up significantly from the $30 million it originally planned to kick in, according to the Duluth News Tribune.
And the scaled back plans do not appear to reflect a slowing of Maurices' growth. The fast-growing company still expects to grow to 600 employees in the next few years.
The original plans for the new office tower reportedly called for creating space on the upper two floors for other businesses that were adding new jobs, but the developer decided to scrap that idea.
Learn more about the project, including new financing plans, here.