OCEAN CITY — Its name doesn’t stand for “bright and beautiful,” but that’s what it’s like inside the newly remodeled B&B Department Store, a mainstay on Asbury Avenue since the 1980s.
“We haven’t changed anything on the outside yet, so people walk by and think we’re the same store but we’re not,” said Jeff Davidson, son of one of the business’ co-founders.
He said he added more than 300 LEDs to the ceiling, reorganized the retail space and made other changes — both physically and metaphysically — in time to open for the summer season after buying the building this spring.
Some of the most iconic aspects of the store remain, including the upside-down VW Beetles and the airplane hanging from the ceiling.
Partners Dave Davidson and Phil Bertole, who had started B&B in 1974, bought the property on the 800 block in 1986 and knocked it down to create an 11,000-plus-square-foot retail space with apartments above it, according to Davidson.
This spring, the store’s former owner went out of business and Davidson bought the property. With the help of store manager Laura Gallagher and others, he quickly turned a vacant store on one of the busiest blocks downtown into a fully functioning retail space with clearly defined areas for men’s, women’s and children’s apparel, as well as footwear, beach gear, jewelry and candy.
Davidson said the store was not very functional when they arrived.
“The registers were in the middle of the floor on both sides and there were aisles on both sides,” Davidson said during a recent tour. “The fluorescent lighting was so dull.”
Gallagher said they had the store up and running in two weeks.
“We had a very small window to get a lot of work accomplished,” she said. “When we got here April 15, not one fixture was built and not one item of clothing was unboxed. Every rack was flat-packed in a box.”
Davidson said they built a platform at each end, where shoppers can find bathing suits, and plans to add more inside the front windows to create displays with manakins.
They also moved the fitting rooms to the back right, what Davidson said was the “deadest space in the store,” creating more traffic in that area.
Gallagher said the fitting rooms had not been open for two years.
“That’s something that people definitely notice,” she said.
Davidson said the back door, which opens onto an alley and several parking lots, also had been kept closed for years but now is open.
Other changes include the hours, which now are 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily. He said several nearby businesses — naming Yianni’s restaurant, Island Gypsy and Ron Jon — have been drawing customers in the evening.
“We are trying to elevate that,” he said.
Davidson said he also has improved the shopping experience.
“I was told the store had gotten dreary over the past three years, that it wasn’t a pleasant place,” he said. “I want people to greet customers, say hello, have a friendly environment. We want people to have a good shopping experience; that’s what we’re all about.”
He said he prefers to have a broad price point for all of the items he sells.
“If you want to come in and buy an O’Neill board short, you can buy that, but if you want to buy a $29.99 or $19.99 bathing suit, we have it,” he said. “I don’t believe in having one price. Some want high, some middle, etc.”
The store employs about 40 people, about a quarter of the 162 companywide, Davidson said.
“We’ve been able to put together a really terrific staff,” Gallagher said, noting they hire 14- and 15-year-olds. “It’s a really nice place to work.”
By CRAIG D. SCHENCK/Sentinel staff