Goodwill Industries of Arkansas President Brian Itzkowitz points to a donation center located near the rear of a new Goodwill store at 705 E. Appleby Road. Officials held a ribbon-cutting and grand opening ceremony Thursday morning in front of the building formerly home to an ALDI grocery store.
Photo: Todd Gill
About 75 people stood in line Thursday morning to be the first to shop at a new Goodwill store in Fayetteville.
Shoppers line up along the north side of the building during a ribbon-cutting ceremony.
Todd Gill
The 14,600-square-foot center, located in the former ALDI grocery store at Appleby Road and College Avenue, is the second retail store in Fayetteville and the organization’s third location in town.
Goodwill opened a 20,000-square-foot store on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard last year, and operates a donation center on Steamboat Drive.
The new store is the sixth Goodwill location in the region and the 31st facility in the state.
Brian Itzkowitz, Goodwill president and CEO, said the opportunity for a centralized location played a big role in the decision to add a second retail space in town. “We want to make it as convenient as possible for people in Fayetteville to be able to shop and donate with us,” he said.
Fayetteville Mayor Lioneld Jordan greets shoppers as they enter the new store.
Todd Gill
Both the new store and the location on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard include a donation center and a career counseling services department.
Officials said a tough economy has led to a surge in the use of the organization’s job centers in Northwest Arkansas. In the last fiscal year, 2,480 people sought career counseling from Goodwill in Fayetteville and Springdale, and 480 people were placed into jobs.
The new location employs about 20 people, marking 120 new jobs added to the region by Goodwill in the past three years.
Grand opening festivities continue through Sunday and include refreshments, giveaways, and a chance to win shopping sprees and a 42-inch HD television.
Operating hours are 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Saturday, and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Sunday.
It would be nice to have a big store in Ft Smith: the Goodwill we have is a joke.
great news! i’m glad to see that building find a new tenant so quickly.
Outstanding. After spending a lot of time in the local Goodwill, Salvation Army, and Habitat for Humanity stores here in NWA, I would like to point out that there are many useful items that are not just thrift clothes. Thank you Goodwill!
Don’t forget Potter’s House.
And The Attic.