Top 10 – #6 Runnings Opens in East St. Cloud

ST. CLOUD -- Today as we continue our countdown of the Top 10 local news stories for 2020 we're at #6 - the opening of a new Running's store in east St. Cloud.

It was about a year ago, in early December of last year, that we learned Runnings had bought the former Shopko building in east St. Cloud.

Director of Marketing Dennis Jensen says the company has had its eye on the St. Cloud market for a while now.

A series of events happened where it all lined up and it felt right to open up a store.  We were able to get a very nice building in good shape.  We felt good about the demand there.

Renovations began in the spring of this year and Jensen says the COVID-19 pandemic did not impact their timeline and they finally opened their doors in September.

He says about 10 years ago Runnings started expanding to new communities.

Runnings started to open more stores, look for opportunities not only in the upper Midwest but also in the northeast part of the United States.  We had about 31 stores 10 years ago and now we've got soon to be 56.

Jensen says so far it's been very positive and they are happy with the response from the community.

We will continue with our countdown of the Top 10 local news stories of the year that do not have anything to do with COVID-19.