Dix Liquors announced this week that it plans to close its Lenexa store, less than a year after relocating there from its long-time storefront in Roeland Park.
In a message posted to Facebook Monday and in interviews with the Post, Dix company officials said the past year has been fraught with challenges.
“This decision was not made lightly, as we have faced numerous challenges and obstacles since the beginning of the leasing process last year,” the company’s Facebook post read.
The Facebook message reiterated what Dix chief operating officer Adam Smith told the Post in an interview last weekend, that the business has been beset by issues “stemming from the former development owner, which carried over to the new development owner.”
Though some optimism remained that Smith and owner John Dix might be able to find an investor to keep the business open in 2024, that has since evaporated and Dix and Smith say a liquidation sale will begin soon.
“We’re just way overhead in debt,” Dix told the Post. “We’ve had a lot of challenges since moving over from Roeland Park.”
Dix moved to Lenexa from Roeland Park last year
Dix, who first acquired the Roeland Park store in 2014, moved his operations to 12028 W. 95th St., in the Oak Park Commons shopping district early last year.
The space, formerly Shogun Sushi & Steak, had been abandoned for four years.
Dix and the company’s chief operating officer Adam Smith, said at the time of the move that they signed a 20-year lease at the Lenexa location, after failing to come to a new rental agreement with the owner of their Roeland Park location.
Challenges mounted after the move, Dix says
Dix said they poured some $700,00 into renovating the property, including creating a nearly 1,000-square-foot, walk-in cooler, which they billed as one of the largest in Johnson County.
But ongoing disputes over the terms of their lease and the changing ownership of the Oak Park Commons complex posed challenges, Dix and Smith say.
In addition, they say they felt compelled to invest in a state-of-the art surveillance system for their new store store due to the level of retail theft at the Lenexa store they had not experienced in Roeland Park.
“Theft is tremendously higher than it was in Roeland Park,” Smith said. “We’ve had to put sensors on everything, even 99 cent items.”
More changes happening at Oak Park Commons
Dix’s new location is in the same retail complex where a long-time Applebee’s restaurant closed late last year.
At the time, a local representative of Applebee’s franchises said the restaurant closed because their lease was up and the landowner decided not to renew.
The nearly 350,000-square-foot complex was recently sold to two national real estate companies, Michigan-based Lormax Stern and New York-based Time Equities, Inc.
Overland Park-based Legacy Development manages the Oak Park Commons properties.
A slim hope that a “new location” can be found
Dix’s Facebook announcement did leave open — if barely — the possibility of a future venture.
“We are committed to finding a new location and reopening our doors in the near future, so that we may continue serving you with the utmost dedication,” the message reads.
Still, Smith, the company COO, admitted to the Post that may be a long shot.
