Bon-Ton shrinks downtown Milwaukee Boston Store
Bon-Ton Stores Inc. is starting to renovate its Milwaukee corporate offices, a move that will also downsize the retail chain’s downtown Boston Store.
Bon-Ton will begin office and store renovations in November, the department store operator has announced. Both projects are scheduled for completion in July.
Bon-Ton earlier agreed to keep operating its corporate offices and the Grand Avenue Boston Store in downtown Milwaukee, totaling around 750 jobs, for at least another 10 years. Those leases were set to expire in January.
The lease extensions are tied to the city providing $1.9 million to help finance $4 million in renovations at the Boston Store building, 331 W. Wisconsin Ave. The Common Council and Mayor Tom Barrett approved that financing proposal in February.
Bon-Ton has around 650 employees in its corporate offices, located mainly on the Boston Store building’s upper floors. The company has about 100 jobs in the department store on the building’s first two floors.
The city’s annual payments to Bon-Ton would be reduced if the overall job count drops.
The project will include shifting office employees from The Blue office building, 310 W. Wisconsin Ave., to the Boston Store building. That building, which includes apartments on the top floors, was sold in March for $25 million to Chicago-based North Wells Capital.
With the new configuration, Bon-Ton corporate offices will occupy a portion of the first, second and fourth floors, and the entire third level of the building.
The offices will include increased natural light, new interior lighting, loftlike ceilings and open stairways.
The Boston Store will have its overall space reduced to create more office space. The children’s, home and furniture departments will be eliminated.
Merchandising changes will introduce new brands and “intensify categories that appeal to downtown customers,” according to Bon-Ton.
The Boston Store Building is owned separately from the Grand Avenue, which is undergoing renovations that include new apartments in the mall’s Plankinton Arcade.