Throwback Thursday: New Terrain

The June 16, 2008 issue of Home Channel News, the forerunner of HBSDealer, featured a story under the headline: “All new Terrain, Urban Outfitters develops lawn and garden concept.”

Here’s how the editors at the time described the new concept: “Think Smith & Hawken meets Barnes & Noble meets Bath & Body Works.”

(Note to younger readers, the upscale lawn and garden retailer Smith & Hawken closed all of its upscale stores in 2009, though the brand lives on at Target.)

Terrain’s first store opened in Glen Mills, Pa. after the conversion of a 118-year-old nursery. into a gardening and lifestyle center near Chadds Ford, Pa., a wealthy Philadelphia suburb.  

The 2008 article describes the launch this way: “They took the 10-acre nursery and added indoor and outdoor furniture, pottery and décor, personal care items, books, cooking utensils and more. In addition, there’s an established landscape design service and a café serving a spa-meets-farmhouse menu.”

Urban Outfitters top brass was bullish on the concept. In early 2008, the CFO described a fragmented lawn and garden market of about $85 billion, of which Home Depot and Lowe’s together owned about 35%. During a presentation to investors, the retailer’s CFO John Kyees described a potential of 50 Terrain stores doing about $20 million each. Add it up and it’s a billion in sales.

That lofty potential has not been realized, at least not yet. But Terrain has expanded into some sophisticated locations – either stand-alone stores (Devon, Pa.; Westport, Conn.; and the original  Glen Mills store), or as “capsule shops” inside select Anthropologie & Co. locations (in the California cities of Palo Alto, Walnut Creek and Century City and also n Bethesda, Md.)

The vision has weathered well over the years. The web site reads: “We are inspired by the idea of merging house and garden to create an immersive natural experience and an environment where our customers can come to unwind, explore, and celebrate occasions big and small.”