Outdoor-gear store REI to open next month in South Huntington shopping center 

Outdoor-goods retailer REI will open its second Long Island store next month, in a South Huntington shopping center undergoing a $75 million redevelopment.

The 21,100-square-foot store is scheduled to open in the Huntington Shopping Center on Nov. 3, REI Co-op said in a statement Wednesday. The store will move into combined spaces formerly occupied by Modell’s Sporting Goods and Dressbarn.

A Seattle-based retailer with 185 stores in 42 states and Washington, D.C., REI sells clothes and gear for camping, hiking, running, cycling, paddling and other outdoor activities. Its only Long Island store is in Carle Place.

The South Huntington store will include a specialty bike shop where certified mechanics will do tuning and repairs, as well as a ski and snowboard shop where employees will mount bindings and tune gear, according to REI.

“Our team of 60 experts is ready to serve the Long Island outdoor community and partner with local groups to welcome everyone into natural places,” Graig Ciminelli, manager of the new store, said in the REI statement. “Regardless of skill or activity level, everyone deserves safe and equitable access to the outdoors. With our knowledge, expertise and stewardship, we look forward to fostering that access for this community.”

Built in 1962 on a 21-acre site at 350 Walt Whitman Rd., the Huntington Shopping Center is undergoing a $75 million redevelopment that is expected to be completed in 2024 and result in mostly new tenants being there by the end of next year, according to Federal Realty Investment Trust, the Rockville, Maryland-based owner of the retail hub.

The redevelopment will reduce the shopping center’s retail space by 25%, though two new out-parcels are being added, to create a more upscale property that will total about 210,000 square feet when the revamp is finished, Federal Realty said.

Only six of the current tenants were in the shopping center before the revamp began in the second quarter of 2022: Michaels and Visionworks, which relocated in the shopping center, as well as Verizon, clothing store Tillys, cosmetics store Ulta and PetSmart.

Newly arrived tenants in the Huntington Shopping Center are furniture store Lovesac, which opened a 1,412-square-foot showroom in July, and a Just Salad eatery, which opened in a 2,382-square-foot unit in August.

Incoming tenants include Whole Foods Market, which will be the largest tenant on the property with a 43,609-square-foot grocery store when it opens next year, while The Container Store, which sells storage and organization products, will open its second Long Island location next spring in a 15,676-square-foot space.

Also, a Paris Baguette franchisee will open a 2,776-square-foot cafe in a new building in the shopping center in April, according to a spokeswoman for the Moonachie, New Jersey-based chain.

Burger Village, an organic burger eatery, is expected to open in a 2,756-square-foot space in the Huntington Shopping Center next week, said Dix Hills resident Nick Yadav, who co-founded the chain on Long Island with his three brothers in 2013.

BFT Fitness will open its 2,649-square-foot studio in the shopping center in the last week of November, said franchisee David Wolk, a Dix Hills resident. 

Also, clothing retailer J.Crew has signed a lease for a 7,766-square-foot unit in a newly constructed space in the development, according to Federal Realty. The store will be a J.Crew Factory, which is a discounter.

There is already a J.Crew store about a three-minute drive away in the Walt Whitman Shops, a shopping mall on Walt Whitman Road.

J.Crew did not respond to questions about when the new store will open and whether the location in the Walt Whitman Shops will be closing.

By Tory N. Parrish

tory.parrish@newsday.comToryParrish1

Tory N. Parrish covers retail and small business for Newsday. She has worked at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and Observer-Dispatch in Utica, N.Y.