Nicole Ryan is finding it hard to say goodbye.
The owner of the Mes Ami pet store on West Galer Street on upper Queen Anne will close the shop on June 5. Ryan has been running the shop since 2006 when she decided to bring together her love of retail with her love for dogs and open the pet boutique.
But after going back to work for the Nordstrom Company as a clothing buyer last fall, Ryan, who is also the mother of a two and a half-year-old son named Jake, said she found having the shop was more than she had bargained for.
Also announcing that she will close her doors is Janie Bolton, the longtime owner of the Magnolia Village’s Around The Block interior design store at 3308 West McGraw. Bolton said she felt that after 22 years, the time was right to try something new and go in a different direction.
“It just got to be too much,” Ryan said of running the Mes Ami store. “I thought maybe I could do it all, work at one job during the week and then spend weekends at the store, but it just became too much.”
Ryan maintains the business, which had gotten good reviews and was even named for having the “best collars and leashes” by Seattle magazine in 2007, was profitable. But with her lease coming to an end in September and her already thinking about moving the store to a new location, Ryan decided it was time to close the operation. She said all items will be discounted this week as everything must go by June 5.
Her landlord has already found a new tenant. The shop will soon be the home of the latest Molly Moon’s Homemade Ice Cream boutique. The company, which has shops in Capitol Hill, Madrona and Wallingford, is known for its gourmet ice cream and innovative flavors.
“It’s devastating,” Ryan said about closing. “It’s been really tough. The last Saturday I worked I must have cried four times. It was so sad. People were hugging me and saying nice things.”
While this store is closing, Ryan hasn’t given up on the idea of moving the store to a new location or selling items online. She might even move to a doggie daycare location.
But she said it is tricky to move locations right now, with the big-box pet operations saturating the market. Ryan said seven or eight small independent pet stores have closed in Seattle during the past five years.
Bolton’s lease was also up in September and that spurred her to make the decision to close her longtime interior design store. She said the sluggish economy played a role in her decision, but she also wanted to leave before it became drudgery.
“I’ve gone back and forth for the last couple of years about this decision, but I’ve decided that it is just a good time in my life to make this decision,” Bolton said. “I’ve always wanted a shop and I was able to do this for 20 years longer than I expected. I know I will miss the people.”
Bolton said she will continue her interior design business and work with customers who are interested in remodeling their homes. But she also has other interests, including planning her daughter Sarah’s upcoming marriage. She also needs to spend more time on her own home. That includes her two dogs. Her famous “shop dog” Gilly, a bearded collie, passed away a few years ago and neither of her new dogs proved to have the right mellow temperament for life inside a retail boutique.
“I wanted to leave while I still love running the business,” Bolton said.
Bolton will begin a storewide sale today, June 1st, that will last through Aug. 31.
In a note to her customers, Bolton wrote “I will miss my fellow Magnolia merchants who work so hard at making the Village a better place for all of us and also the customers whom I have come to call my friends!”
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