Store Reporter

Retail & Restaurant news for Rockville & Potomac. We know it all. And we like to share.

Kids & Teen Stores

Hello Urban Plates and LebTav, goodbye to half The Gap, two more closings at Rockville Town Square

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Urban Plates arrives

The Dining Terrace at Westfield Montgomery mall looks a whole lot different this week: Urban Plates officially debuts on Monday (March 11th), but crowds started lining up on Thursday with tickets to pre-opening events. The restaurant offers a fresh-cooked cafeteria-style menu of soups, salads, and sandwiches along with more elaborate entrées, baked goods and juices. For a look at the menu, click here. For a look at the interior, check out our photos on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

Wink Eyecare Boutique
Realtor Lisa Nasar of Long & Foster

New look for Lebanese Taverna

LebTav, the new version of local favorite Lebanese Taverna, opened its doors this week a few doors down from its longtime home at Congressional Plaza. LebTav is smaller than its predecessor, with a pared-down menu of salads, pita sandwiches, falafel, shawarma, hummus and grab-and-go items. For more on the new format — and lots more about all the changes at Congressional Plaza — check out our Feb. 21 and  Feb. 28 editions.

Trio Jr.

Two more closings at Rockville Town Square

The exodus at Rockville Town Square continued this week when two neighboring businesses on Gibbs Street — Lab Cafe and Little Dipper Hot Pot House — closed their doors within days of each other. Lab Cafe, a bubble tea shop that opened in 2017, is the fifth business to fail at the same address since 2007. (Remember Bobby’s Crabcakes, Tippy’s Taco House, 82 Steak Out and Ev & Maddy’s?) Little Dipper also opened two years ago in the corner spot that once housed Noodles & Company. Add these two to the list of recent RTS closings that now includes Pandora Seafood House & Bar, Mellow Mushroom and LiquidBlue Denim Boutique, along with the neighboring Apollo restaurant. Dawson’s Market also closed last October, but it reopened in December under new ownership.

Realtor Jacqueline Band-Olinger of Greystone Realty

Rolling into Park Potomac

Roll by Goodyear has rolled into Park Potomac, opening a new store between Elevation Burger and The Wine Harvest. This is the space that once housed the Emily Grace boutique, most recently home to the pop-up Pooch Portrait Studio. Roll, which installs tires wherever you are, has blanketed Montgomery County with a half-dozen stores in the past few months.

Churchill Blast
Alice in Wonderland at Herbert Hoover Middle School

Big week for The Gap & Gymboree

Gap Inc. made so many announcements this week that even we found it hard to keep up. Number one, the company said it will close about half of its 500ish Gap stores over the next two years. Number two, it will spin off the thriving Old Navy brand into a separate publicly traded company. Number three, it will purchase the Janie and Jack kids’ clothing chain from bankrupt Gymboree Group. Meanwhile, Gymboree Group got some other good news when rival retailer The Children’s Place announced plans to purchase and “revitalize” what’s left of the Gymboree brand. Does that mean the Gymboree stores are no longer going out of business? The answer isn’t clear yet — and all these plans still have to go through bankruptcy court.

Diener Denim Plus Diamonds
mailto:publisher@storereporter.com

Behnke leaves Potomac, Chicken Out flies the coop, Pottery Barn back to Bethesda

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Behnkes logo

 

Goodbye Behnke

Behnke Nurseries, a fixture in Potomac for 16 years, will close its River Road location at the end of the July 4th weekend. Behnke vice president Stephanie Fleming, whose grandparents started the company in 1930, says the Potomac lease was up for renewal “and the cost of staying on that property simply didn’t make business sense anymore.” Fleming says she hopes Behnke’s loyal customers will consider making the half-hour trip to its flagship location in Beltsville, where they’ll find “eleven acres with plenty of parking, greenhouses under cover, and lots of seminars and events.”

 

Chicken Out ChickenChicken Out is really out

We hate to be the bearer of more bad news — especially after last week’s report on the demise of Vince & Dominic’s Pizzeria  — but it looks like the once-thriving Chicken Out chain has officially flown the coop. Once an ambitious company with multiple D.C.-area locations and plans for a national expansion, Chicken Out struggled in recent years with the direction of its menu and other issues. The company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2011, changing hands in 2012 to a new owner who spoke of opening more locations at a rapid pace. But things didn’t work out that way: The last remaining Chicken Out closed earlier this year, and the company’s phone numbers don’t work anymore.

 

PottPBteen Logoery Barn back to Bethesda

Pottery Barn and Pottery Barn Kids, which exited the White Flint Mall last winter for the Mazza Gallerie in Chevy Chase, will be moving back to Bethesda in 2015. The two stores — and possibly PBteen as well — will share a brand new home on the ground floor of The Darcy, an upscale condo building under construction on Bethesda Avenue. This would be the second PBteen store in the D.C. area; the first makes its debut next week at Tysons Corner Center in Virginia. So if your daughter has her eye on on that aqua and hot pink floral bedding set from the PBteen catalog, take a tip from Store Reporter: Check it out in person before you plunk down your $250.

 

Last Letter from ThinkFunGame giveaway

Store Reporter has been reviewing Last Letter, a new word game by ThinkFun that’s perfect for your summer family vacation. What we love about this game: It’s easy to learn, each round takes just a couple of minutes, and there’s no waiting around for somebody else to take a turn. (However, all players must be old enough to spell.) Congratulations to Sharon Morris, who won Store Reporter’s raffle for a Last Letter game of her own. Follow us on Facebook to enter your name in future raffles.

 

Goodbye Vince & Dominic’s, hello Chipotle; B Scene’s teen scene

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Pizza

Goodbye Vince & Dominic’s

Many Store Reporter readers were saddened by the May 30 closing of Vince & Dominic’s Pizzeria, site of countless sports team parties and family outings for more than three decades. Home Depot, which owns the shopping center across from Westfield Montgomery Mall, took some heat when the restaurant’s owners publicly blamed the company for not renewing their lease. But Home Depot spent a year trying to work with the owners after they fell behind in their rent, says company spokesman Stephen Holmes. The departure of Vince & Dominic’s leaves the property with several vacant storefronts. Holmes says no decisions have been made about what to do with all the empty space.

 

 

Chipotle BurritoHello Chipotle

We were the first to tell you that Chipotle was coming to Potomac Village. (See our Feb. 6 and April 3 editions.) Now we’re here to tell you when you can get in line for your first burrito. Mark your calendars for June 23.

 

 

talbot red doorsWelcome back Talbots and Konplott

Talbots, the classic women’s clothing chain that joined the mass exodus from White Flint Mall several months ago, opened its big red doors last week on the lower level of Westfield Montgomery Mall. And Konplott, the European jewelry store that vacated its space near Macy’s last month, has returned in the form of a kiosk outside Nordstrom.

 

 

Living Royal Jellybean Socks

Teen Scene at B Scene

B Scene, the trendy clothing boutique at Cabin John Shopping Center & Mall, is expanding its product line to appeal to kids and teens. “We have a lot of customers who have been with us since the time they had babies, and now those babies are 10, 12, 14 years old — so it’s fun for them to come in with mom and get something for themselves,” says Ilana Kashdin, who runs the store with her own mom, Robin Greger. The change is also a natural result of the store’s relocation two years ago from an outside storefront to an inside space near Shoe Train, Toy Castle, My Gym and other child-focused businesses. “There are a lot more kids now walking by and looking through our windows,” Kashdin says. So she makes sure they’ll spot something they like: boys’ lacrosse shorts from Flow Society, for example, and girls’ clothes from companies like Malibu Sugar, Dori Creations and Les Tout Petites. Not to mention the kitschy socks of the season from Living Royal ($8 a pair), featuring photo-realistic images like the jellybeans shown here.

 

Toys of Summer: Soccer stickers, card games and fish pops — plus a My Gym discount

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The toys of summer

Last summer marked the beginning of the Rainbow Loom craze, as children all over the country started plastering their wrists with bracelets they crocheted from tiny colored rubber bands. With school about to end once again, we asked local stores for the scoop on which toys will be capturing our kids’ attention this summer. For more on this topic, check out our Facebook postings from June 18 and July 22.

 

FIFA World Cup Sticker BookFIFA World Cup soccer sticker albums

These $2 books from Panini are ready to be filled with stickers featuring 18 players from 32 competing teams, plus other images from the World Cup. The $1 sticker sheets are “something kids can purchase with their own money, which is important,” says Kathy Kingsbury, manager of Toy Kingdom at Rockville Town Square. A Panini World Cup van, stocked with giveaways, sticker-trading opportunities and a giant inflatable soccer goal, will visit Toy Castle at the Cabin John Mall on June 30.

 

Spot It! Splash

Blue Orange card games

Card games are especially handy in the summer, since they’re easily transportable for families on vacation and kids at sleepaway camp. Kingsbury of Toy Kingdom likes Spot It! Splash (about $15), a new summertime version of the popular game from Blue Orange. “The cards are waterproof so you can take them to the beach, and all the images have beach themes,” she says. Steve Aarons, co-owner of Child’s Play at Congressional Plaza, likes Blue Orange‘s new game BraveRats (about $10), in which rats with special powers battle in “a sort of advanced version of Rock Paper Scissors,” he says. “Kids are going to play this over the summer, and then tell their friends about it when they get back to school.”

 

Frozen princesses

Lego Movie, Spiderman and Frozen

Anything related to these movies (or the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles flick that opens in August) is expected to sell well this summer. The surprise here is the longevity of Frozen, which debuted last winter and has yet to see a thaw in popularity. “Disney really did not foresee the response to this movie” and didn’t produce enough Frozen toys to meet demand, says Toy Castle owner Brian Mack. That’s made it tough for locally owned stores to get their hands on Frozen merchandise other than coloring books, sticker albums and the like. “Anything related to that movie is selling out as soon as we get it,” Mack says.

 

Zoku Fish Pop Molds

Slushes and Fish Pops

Zoku, whose Quick Pop Maker has become a summer staple these past few years, has expanded its product lineup. The company’s Slush & Shake Makers (about $20) “have been doing incredibly well,” says Aarons of Child’s Play. “You can take anything, pour it inside, stir it, and you’ve got instant slush,” he says. If you don’t care about the instant part, Zoku’s new Fish Pop Molds (also $20) create incredibly detailed popsicles shaped like sharks, puffer fish and other undersea creatures.

 

Birthday packages at My GymMy Gym Logo

If you know a little one with a birthday coming up, My Gym has introduced a new selection of party packages that take care of every detail: themed paper goods, pinatas, food platters, goodie bags, custom ice cream cakes and more. “It’s easier this way for parents, with more one-stop shopping and the option for add-ons,” says My Gym owner Mandy Lemar.  Store Reporter readers can save $25 on 2014 My Gym parties booked before the end of June. Click here for our coupon page.

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P.F. Chang’s, Old Navy and other mall rumors

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P.F. Chang's

 

A move for P.F. Chang’s?

P.F. Chang’s, one of the last remaining tenants at the nearly-empty White Flint Mall, may not be sticking around much longer. We hear the upscale Chinese restaurant could end up joining its former neighbor, Cheesecake Factory, in making the move to Westfield Montgomery Mall. Insiders say Montgomery wants to add more restaurants to the section where Cheesecake Factory moved last year, which so far includes Bobby’s Burger Palace, Aroma Espresso Bar and the soon-to-open Blaze Pizza. A furniture store in that area recently closed, and other departures are expected as the mall carves out space for more dining options. Even Old Navy is rumored to be on the way out — either leaving the mall altogether, or relocating to smaller quarters in another wing.

 

 

American Classic Clothes

 

Tale of a classic

Another tenant who made the move from White Flint to Montgomery Mall says she couldn’t be happier with her new digs. “My sales are twice what they were at White Flint,” says American Classic Clothes owner Lenore Briskman, who’s been designing and sewing traditional children’s apparel for more than three decades. Briskman opened her original store in Potomac Village after people admired the clothes she made for her own children. “My customers range from Nancy Marriott and other multimillionaires to the waiter at the Cheesecake Factory two doors down,” says Briskman, whose husband Robert was a founding executive with Sirius Satellite Radio. Still a bundle of energy at 78, Briskman says sewing and running the store are her favorite forms of relaxation. “The mall asked me when I plan to retire,” she says. “I told them, ‘When they throw dirt in my face.'”

 

Lilly Pulitzer scarf

 

Loving Lilly

Elsewhere at Montgomery Mall, it appears the new Lilly Pulitzer store is already a hit with all those super-coordinated women who plan ahead for summer family portraits at the beach. “The little girls are coming in with their mothers to get swimsuits, then the mom will get the beach cover-up or a dress in the same pattern, the grandma will get the longer shorts, and then they’ll get ties for the men to match,” says assistant store manager Kelly Fay. “They want to put together a great family photograph to remember their vacation.” Fay says the store also has been “flying through” its inventory of any pattern with a crab motif, including Maryland-themed scarves (sold only in this region) and the pink-and-green Get Crackin’ design shown here.

 

Chipotle in the Village, fresh choices at Starbucks, playgrounds on the Pike

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Chipotle Burrito

 

Chipotle in Potomac Village: Yes or no?

In our Feb. 4 debut issue we reported that Chipotle was heading to Potomac Village, taking over the former Chicken Out space next to Starbucks. But two months have passed now, and that still-empty storefront has seen little action beyond the parade of caffeinated burrito lovers sadly pressing their noses against its window. Meanwhile, Store Reporter has lost count of how many times she’s been emailed, texted and stopped on the street by people who want to know: Is Chipotle still coming? So she checked. And the answer is still yes. But it won’t open in early spring as originally planned; probably closer to late May or the beginning of June.

 

 

Starbucks La Boulange Chocolate Croissant

In with the new at Starbucks

Speaking of Starbucks: If you stopped at one this week, you may have noticed that all the baked goods have suddenly been replaced by a new menu from La Boulange, a gourmet bakery that was acquired by Starbucks in 2012. In other parts of the country where the new menu was rolled out earlier, customer complaints led to the return of a few old favorites like pumpkin bread and lemon loaf cake. And it appears the reception in this market has been decidedly mixed as well: A half-dozen local baristas told us that only the chocolate croissants are getting universally great reviews. So: What do you think of the new Starbucks menu? Tell us your thoughts on Store Reporter’s Facebook page.

 

 

Creative Playthings Swingset, Congressional Plaza

 

Sliding into Rockville Pike

Creative Playthings, the Virginia-based manufacturer of backyard playgrounds, has moved its swings and slides to a new home at Rockville’s Congressional Plaza. The shopping center location marks a new strategy for the company, which previously operated out of a Gaithersburg warehouse space. But the departure of Harry & David opened up a prime spot at Congressional, which caters to families with tenants like The Children’s Place, Child’s Play and Cartoon Cuts. “We certainly are getting a lot of traffic at this location,” says Creative Playthings store manager Dale Rawlings. “All the kids are coming through and pointing us out to their parents.”

 

Blazing fast pizza, Burton’s Olympic buzz, goodbye China Jade

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Blaze Pizza Assembly Line

 

Pizza in a flash at the mall

Blaze Pizza, a hot new concept from the founders of Wetzel’s Pretzels, will make its Maryland debut this summer at Westfield Montgomery Mall. The California-based chain, which has attracted such high-profile investors as Maria Shriver, is known for its Chipotle-style assembly line: Customers watch as their ball of dough is flattened into a crust, topped by their choice of 40 fresh ingredients, then flash-fired for two minutes in a super-hot oven. The Montgomery Mall location, which will open near Old Navy, is just the beginning for Blaze in this market. Virginia and D.C. locations are in the works.

 

 

Burton_patchwork_jacket

 

Olympic buzz for Burton

Excitement about the winter Olympics has been great for business at Burton, the Vermont-based snowboarding company. At its Westfield Montgomery Mall store, which opened last August with a broad selection of boards, boots and winter clothes, “jacket sales have been up crazy amounts” since the Olympics began, says assistant manager Cory Brown. But there’s one item in high demand that the store just can’t provide: the patchwork jackets worn by the U.S. snowboarding team. “Only the athletes can wear them right now,” Brown says. Not for long, though. A civilian version is coming later this year.

 

 

China Jade Bistro, Cabin John Shops

 

No more mu shu

It looks like we’ve seen the last of China Jade Bistro at the Cabin John Shopping Center. Doors have been closed for more than a week at the neighborhood eatery, which replaced the similarly named Jade Billows just a few years ago.

 

 

Mr. Potato HeadToy story

Also closing in the next few weeks, after two decades as a Potomac Village fixture, is the charming toy shop Toys Unique. “I’ve never carried computer games, Xbox or things like that — just good basic toys that don’t get outdated,” says owner Jarunee Chantraparnik, who is retiring. The mix of shops in Potomac Village has changed a lot in 20 years, she says, and her customers’ buying habits have changed too. “Now the younger parents seem to be doing everything through the Internet.”

 

New grocer in Potomac Village, Legal Sea Foods closes, steaks in downtown Rockville

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Potomac Grocer

 

New grocer in the Village

Potomac Grocer, an upscale market specializing in local, natural and organic foods, is finally making its long-awaited debut in Potomac Village. “We’re kind of like a Whole Foods or Balducci’s, but much smaller,” says owner Tom Spencer, noting that he’s put a lot of time into hiring the right staff. That includes two chefs — one dedicated to pastries, and the other focused on preparing meals to go. Potomac Grocer is on River Road next to Walgreens, in the space that spent decades serving horseback riders as The Surrey.

 

 

Legal Sea Foods logo

 

Legal no longer

Speaking of seafood: Boston-based Legal Sea Foods has closed its restaurant at Westfield Montgomery Mall. No comment from the company, which also shuttered locations in Florida and New York. As we told you last week, the mall plans to open several new restaurants and a movie theater later this year. But it’s still deciding what to do with Legal’s leftover space.

 

82 Steak Out, Rockville Town Square

 

Steaking a claim on Rockville

There’s a new place to eat in Rockville Town Square: 82 Steak Out has opened on Gibbs Street next to Noodles & Company. The concept is based on the French tradition of steak-and-fry eateries, says co-owner Anna Don, “but with an American twist” of a slightly broader menu — including sides like creamed spinach, cauliflower and sautéed mushrooms. Not to mention Philly cheesesteak sandwiches, which you definitely won’t find in Paris.

 

 

Pottery Barn Kids logo

 

Kids’ Stores R Gone

Toys R Us and Pottery Barn Kids both exited Rockville Pike in recent weeks as their former homes — Mid-Pike Plaza and White Flint Mall — draw closer to dates with the wrecking ball. PB Kids bounced back right away, opening a new location at Mazza Gallerie in D.C. But Toys R Us, which has struggled for market share in recent years, says it has no plans to reopen in this area. The next-closest store is in Gaithersburg.