Outlet mall being planned along Highway 169 in Jordan, Minn.
JORDAN, Minn. (KMSP) - If you like shopping and you like outlet malls, then a city just southwest of the metro might have you covered. A brand new outlet mall could be coming to Jordan, Minn. near Shakopee.
A chunk of land along Highway 169 in Jordan doesn't look like much right now, but the city has big plans.
"The whole time I've been here for the last 16 years, we've been trying to get someone in that site, and this is the first time it's been very close,” city administrator Tom Nikunen said.
They have a developer interested in putting in an outlet mall. And although it's far from breaking ground, the plans already have people talking.
"It's going to help the gas stations, the grocery stores; it will help every business in town,” Kathy Kreuser, Iris Valley Boutique, said.
With a clothing boutique less than a mile from the site, Kreuser may be the last person you would expect to support the plans. But she says competition is actually good for business – "If they're coming to Jordan to go to the outlet mall, they might go 'hey there's a really beautiful boutique in town, let's go see what they have.'"
In the last couple of months, the city commissioned a market study on the land and found that with 40,000 cars passing the site every day and nothing similar in the southwest metro, the land would make a great shopping destination.
"Our city doesn't have a lot of clothing shops because we are 6,500 people so we don't feel that it competes with other businesses so we feel it could be a catalyst to help the businesses that we already have and draw in other businesses,” Nikunen said.
Nikunen says the project will cost $100 million to $150 million and will span more than thirty acres – “It draws so many more businesses, hotels restaurants around it that we could benefit from.”