Duluth Trading to move to Mount Horeb
The parent company of Duluth Trading Co. plans to build a new headquarters in Mount Horeb and relocate its corporate staff there.
The move would place the main offices of the growing retailer in the same town as its flagship store and bring some 250 jobs to Mount Horeb, a quaint village in western Dane County that has emphasized its Norwegian roots — and attracted tourists — by sprinkling the streets with a growing number of troll statues (34 at the moment).
Duluth Holdings Inc. now is based in Belleville, a smaller village that straddles the Dane-Green County line. The company also has a warehouse there that it will continue to operate, Nicholas Owen, Mount Horeb village administrator, said Wednesday.
The village’s Plan Commission has recommended approval of construction of a five-story, 108,000-square-foot building to house Duluth. The proposal was due to go to the Village Board Wednesday evening. Owen said earlier in the day that he expected approval.
While Belleville and Mount Horeb are about the same distance from Madison, the new location will provide Duluth with a higher profile. Besides Mount Horeb’s status as a tourist stop, the village is only a 10-minute drive on Highway 151 from Verona, where thousands of people work at the sprawling campus of software maker Epic Systems.
Mount Horeb also is home to Duluth’s first brick-and-mortar store, a shop that, with a tool museum inside, is something of a destination itself.
Duluth Holdings has asked Mount Horeb for financial assistance through tax incremental financing. Such plans typically see a community paying for public improvements that benefit a commercial development — new sidewalks or sewer lines, for example. Property taxes generated by the new development go to repay the village funds over time.
Owen would not say how much tax incremental financing Duluth is seeking, saying the matter is still being negotiated by the village and company.
Executives of Duluth, which has not yet announced the headquarters move, were not available for comment Wednesday.
Plans submitted to the village indicate that construction of the new headquarters building is expected to begin in February, with Duluth taking occupancy a year later. The structure would have an industrial look and be located between Front St. and the Military Ridge State Trail, which is popular with bicycle riders. Window displays would feature Duluth’s noted, sometimes irreverent, graphics.
Revenue up 27% at Duluth Trading
Started in 1989 by two carpenters in Duluth, Minn., who invented a tool organizer they called the Bucket Boss, Duluth Trading has evolved into a rapidly growing retailer of rugged clothing designed for building-trades workers but purchased largely by regular consumers.
Known for mischievous marketing that often uses body humor, the company saw its sales nearly double from 2013 to last year. For the first six months of 2016, sales were up 24% from a year earlier. The firm went public in November 2015.
Primarily an online and catalog retailer, Duluth opened its first store in 2010 and has been gradually expanding its brick-and-mortar presence — a step that not only brings in new sales but heightens awareness of the still-relatively-small company in key markets. Duluth now has stores open, or has leased space for future openings, in about 20 locations.