With its lease on College Avenue ending, My Sister’s Closet is opening two stores at College Mall. The College Avenue location will remain open until the lease is up at the end of August.
My Sister’s Closet is a nonprofit organization which provides secondhand women’s clothing and free services to help prepare low-income women in vulnerable situations for the workforce. Services include providing women with free work attire, hygiene products, interview skills training, resume services, and financial wellness programming.
Sandy Keller, the nonprofit’s founder and executive director, said the lease on College Avenue began in 2014.
Keller said the lease was originally supposed to end on July 7 but it was extended to August 31.
“We're here because the mall has reached out to us and said that they saw a problem where our lease was ending, and they offered to give us a very, very generous low monthly rent to get us in here,” Keller said.
One of its stores, located across from Blondie’s Cookies, is already open. It’s dedicated to formal and bridal attire and fine jewelry. The Luxury Boutique is open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday and noon to 8 p.m. on Sundays.
Keller said the hope is to have the second store open in the next few weeks. The second store will be dedicated to professional and casual clothing. It will be located across from My Sister’s Closet Luxury Boutique, next to Mama Dukes Hawaiian Barbecue.
Due to location and lack of space, Keller said she is concerned how the nonprofit will continue its client services at the mall. Currently, the nonprofit is serving clients at the College Avenue location until the lease ends.
She said there are having conversations with the mall’s management to discuss possibilities. She said it would be helpful if the mall allows them to serve clients but it would not be optimal.
Most of the clients come from downtown Bloomington or the west or south side of Bloomington, and travel by foot or public transportation.
“That's really the main concern: how easy and accessible can we make it for the women that we are serving to come in here,” Keller said.
Last year, the nonprofit had 252 clients and some came in for several appointments, she said. Its location on College Avenue, including garage space and offices, is 9,400 square feet. At the mall, both stores are 1,800 square feet each.
Receiving donations at the mall is also a concern regarding space at one of the mall entrances to make donating easily accessible for everyone, Keller said.
My Sister’s Closet is still working on renovations on the building it purchased last May on West Second Street. The nonprofit has been raising funds and applying for grants to help pay for the renovations. Keller said the hope is to get it running by September.
The West Second Street location will have its own client services center including classroom led mentoring and a childcare center.
Whether the nonprofit keeps both the mall location and the West Second Street location is undecided.