Now this is a bargain that might have to be seen to be believed.
Officials from 99 Cents Only Stores, known famously for their grocery store full of goods for under $1, confirmed to The Courier on Wednes-day that they are currently scouting locations on Rodeo Drive to potentially open a 99 Cents Only Store in Beverly Hills.
When news broke Wednesday afternoon via press release, it was met with some skepticism across the Internet fashion commu-nity about how a 99 Cents Only Store might fit next to some of the upscale fashion boutiques it would neighbor on Rodeo Drive. 99 Cent Only Store offi-cials insist, however, that their interest is completely legitimate.
“Our cashiers see the customers addresses on their drivers licenses a lot of them come from Beverly Hills,” 99 Cents Only Store CEO Eric Schiffer told The Courier. “Everybody loves bargains on quality items.”
99 Cents Only Store President Jeff Gold said the store is currently scouting locations on Rodeo Drive, but no timetable was given for how long that might take or what kind of space the store was looking for. Count the Rodeo Drive Committee among skeptics of 99 Cents Only’s an-nouncement.
The committee said in a statement: “Based upon some of the highest com-mercial retail rents in the world and the fact that Rodeo Drive is experiencing the street’s highest occupancy in recent memory, it’s highly unlikely that a 99 Cents store will ever open on the street. The company issued a similar statement 10 years ago, and the announcement never came to fruition.
Gold said in an open letter that the company’s highest grossing store is just outside of Beverly Hills at 6121 Wilshire Blvd. He said that location has annual sales of more than $12 million.
99 Cents Only Store is “quite serious and we would love to open a store on Rodeo Drive; and we are not doing this to prove a point,” Gold added.
