Goodwill opens outlet store in Airway Heights

Goodwill Industries of the Inland Northwest marked the opening Monday of its first combined outlet and retail store with a new facility at 9837 W. Flight Drive.

The address is technically inside Spokane city limits, but it is next to the border with Airway Heights, spokeswoman Heather Alexander said.

“We had lines outside the doors for both sides starting at about 8 a.m.,” Alexander said. “We surpassed the budget for the day.”

The opening of the new facility meant the end for the Goodwill Outlet at 1406 E. Front Ave. It opened in 2013 and crews closed it down Saturday and moved all of the items to the new Flight Drive facility on Sunday.

“Our goal in opening the outlet in 2013 was twofold. First, we want to get as much value as possible out of donated items,” Kara Cheney, who is senior vice president of operations, said in a news release. “The outlet gives us an additional opportunity to receive revenues from our donations before we prepare unsellable items for the secondary market or for recycling.

“Second, we can keep more items out of the waste stream because of the salvage and recycling operations at the outlet,” she said.

Alexander said the difference between a thrift store and an outlet is basically how the donated items are sold.

In the store, small items and clothing are sold by the piece. In outlets, they are sold by the pound.

“The outlet is where things go that haven’t sold in our stores or didn’t go into our stores because they were missing pieces,” she said. At the outlet “most things sell by the pound. And the more you buy, the lower the price gets.”

If items do not sell at the outlet, they are run through again or they go to salvage or recycling, she said.

In the past five years, Goodwill has kept more than 100 million pounds of waste from area landfills through the sale, salvage and recycling of donated items through its stores, according to the news release.

The new location is the first for the organization to combine both a thrift store and an outlet.

Goodwill purchased the 6.2 acres in July 2021, said Clark Brekke, president and CEO of Goodwill Industries of the Inland Northwest.

“Our retail stores are the primary source of support for our local Goodwill programs,” Brekke said in a news release. “We are excited for the opportunity to bring more support to our Goodwill programs with the addition of this new facility.”

The 60,000-square-foot building houses a Goodwill store, Goodwill outlet, warehouse space, salvage operations, 15 loading bays and offices.

The campus will house 70 employees and create 23 new jobs. The building was designed by Bernardo Wills Architects and constructed by Baker Construction and Development, both of Spokane.