Best Products Is Paring Down -- Southcenter Store To Stay Open, While Others Shut Their Doors

SOUTHCENTER

When the Best Products Inc. store on Westlake Avenue closes its doors at the end of June, it will end a vision by the late Sidney Jaffe that began more than 40 years ago. The more profitable Southcenter store, however, will remain open.

The Seattle store opened in a different era when there was less retail competition and fewer discount store chains. Opened in 1956 by Jaffe as Jafco Co., it was located nearby and moved to the present location at 520 Westlake Ave. N. in 1963. The outlet has been owned by Best since 1982.

But now it is one of 24 catalog showrooms and 15 jewelry stores being closed this summer by Best, a Richmond, Va., company in bankruptcy reorganization.

Best President Stewart Kasen said the closings - which won't affect area suburban stores here and in Bellevue and Lynnwood - are being made to improve the company's financial performance. He said the company decided these stores wouldn't "contribute significantly to the company's profitability in coming years."

His company filed for reorganization in January as it tried to reduce expenses by $30 million by laying off 350 workers and freezing salaries. The closings and the sale of related assets were approved in a court order signed Tuesday in the New York federal bankruptcy court that is handling Best Products' reorganization.

Retail industry analyst Kenneth Gassman of Wheat, First Securities brokerage in Richmond, said the closings were expected. "A retailer in Chapter 11 has to get rid of its unprofitable stores," Gassman said. "They need to cut their losses, and they also generate cash from the sale of assets. If there was any surprise, it was that more stores weren't shut down."

Best Products was hurt by a broad economic decline that has pinched a number of retailers. The company listed assets and liabilities of about $1.5 billion each in its Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing.

Best had sales of about $1.8 billion in fiscal 1990, down about 14 percent from $2.1 billion the year before. Sales since the fiscal year ended at the beginning of February have been sharply lower than 1990 levels.

A company statement said about 550 full-time and 1,000 part-time employees are being offered severance pay. Best employs about 13,900 in its other operations.

Ross Richardson, Best spokesman in Richmond, said 58 employees in the Seattle store, of which one third are full-time, will lose their jobs.

Other areas are being harder hit with closures than Seattle. Best is closing six showrooms in the Kansas City market and five in St. Louis. The company said it will continue operating 171 showrooms in 24 states and 18 jewelry stores..

Best moved into this market in 1982 when it purchased 17 Jafco stores in Washington and Oregon. Jafco had been owned by a Minnesota retailing company for 10 years.

-- Material from Associated Press was included in this article.