Business

Furniture store relocating to Kidder Street in Wilkes-Barre

November 14, 2007

EFO blames strip club for move

By Ron Bartizek rbartizek@timesleader.com
Business & Consumer / City Editor

WILKES-BARRE TWP. – EFO Furniture Galleries will move its Mundy Street store into the former Circuit City building on Kidder Street. In a mailed advertisement to customers, EFO owner Joe Rinkunas blamed the move on the presence across the parking lot of Gentlemen’s Club 10.

“Within 6 months of the strip club opening we saw our business decline significantly,” Rinkunas wrote. Gentlemen’s Club 10 opened in March 2006 after a months-long court battle with Wilkes-Barre Township over the right of dancers to remove all their clothing.

A mattress store was in the building that now houses the nude dancing club when the furniture store moved to Mundy Street from North Pennsylvania Avenue in 1998.

The approximately 30,000-square-foot Circuit City property became available in mind-2004 when the store relocated to a new shopping center anchored by Target.

EFO’s move will be a loss to the township, since the old Circuit City building is in Wilkes-Barre city.

A store employee said Rinkunas was traveling and not available to comment on Tuesday.

The advertisement did not say when the move would take place.

Ron Bartizek, Times Leader business editor, may be reached at 970-7157.

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