WICHITA — Atlanta-based Aaron’s has closed its three rent-to-own stores in Wichita.
“We elected to exit the market,” COO Ken Butler says. “Now, that doesn’t mean that we won’t come back.”
Butler says about this time every year, the company analyzes what leases are ending and what stores might be underperforming. That’s what happened here.
“It just means it was kind of pulling some weeds.”
Butler doesn’t blame the market.
“Nine times out of 10, it’s never the market. It’s the management.”
The former Aaron’s space on Pawnee is going to become a Rent-A-Center store.
Butler says Aaron’s will “rethink a strategy and come back later.”
“We will definitely come back. There’s just no question.”
UPDATED — Craig Peterson acknowledges that there are already some good mattress stores in Wichita, but that’s not stopping him from opening Bedtime Mattress Outlet later this month.
“I believe that there’s a need for it here,” he says of a mattress store that sells quality mattresses at discount prices.
“I’m just the alternative to what’s out there right now.”
Competitors such as Mattress Hub are “good companies, and they are selling great beds . . . but they are on a higher-end scale.”
Mark Barrientos of Mattress Hub takes exception to that.
“We have mattresses that start at $59 and go all the way up,” he says.
Peterson is a former Rent-A-Center district manager who most recently has been operating two discount mattress stores in Oklahoma City.
He wanted “to be able to bring that back to my hometown.”
His first store is set to open by Jan. 27 at the northwest corner of Harry and Rock.
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