Apr 3, 2008

Luggage store packs its bags downtownBy Stan BullardCrainsCleveland.com

Scratch another legacy retailer from battered Euclid Avenue in downtown Cleveland.

This time it is Traveler’s Shoppes and Cleveland Trunk, a luggage and gift store in the city’s Theater District since 1936 that traces its history here to 1894.

Only the retailer’s main location at 1309 Euclid in the Cowell & Hubbard building is closing, said Douglas Frankel, president of the family-owned concern he runs with his brother, Tom Frankel. The company’s four other locations remain open. The other stores are in Akron, Canton, and two in Beachwood—at LaPlace Fashion Centre and Beachwood Place Mall.

Douglas Frankel said Playhouse Square Foundation asked the merchant to leave because it plans to renovate the building and bring in new tenants.

The foundation, which operates the city’s restored historic theaters and guides redevelopment in the city’s Theater District, bought the building for $1 million last October. The purchase was part of the plan to create a “Design District” displaying the region’s industrial design strength and product makers who employ it.

“It’s kind of a happy-sad thing,” Douglas Frankel said. “They want to do more to help downtown. We will be able to change our business and move toward retirement.” Four generations have worked in the company, he said, and the next generation already is working there.

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