Laguna Beach is set to get a new REI co-op which is opening soon. This has been confirmed by REI co-op as well as photographs showing the new location taking place. The REI co-op will be replacing the old Marshall’s building after renovations. The grand opening is slated for Sept 15-17 and will bring camping gear to Orange County.

Overall, this is an interesting move from REI, seeing as many stores have recently closed in the area. With this in mind, it will be interesting to see if they can buck the trend and make it financially viable. Clearly, Marshall’s could not achieve this in the same location.

Having said this, Orange County certainly has lots of cool hiking trails which means that this could do well and serve a gap in the market. Historically, one of the main criticisms of REI is that some of their products can be pretty expensive. Nonetheless, as this is Laguna Beach, it doesn’t seem like this will be much of an issue when dealing with a wealthy customer base.

Ultimately time will tell to see if this is a success or not. Nonetheless, it’s good to see something new crop up and shows that offline retail isn’t dead which is good for the OC community.