Not only are we celebrating our 25th anniversary being in business, but we’re also celebrating 5-years of being headquartered in the historic Kresge building in downtown Bay City. The company started with 20 employees in the building and has grown to 80 employees.
The Bay City Kresge was originally built in 1940 by Sebastian Spering Kresge, an American businessman who created and owned two chains of department stores, one being the 20th century’s largest discount retail organization, known in modern times as Sears Holdings Corporation, parent of Kmart and Sears. By 1962, Kresge’s was opening Kmart stores and officially changed its name to Kmart in 1977.
When Bay City’s Kresge’s closed in 1983, the building was renovated, renamed Landmark Plaza, and housed several small businesses. It remained on the market for over 20 years until 2015 when we purchased the building. We were outgrowing our previous “Home Office” location on Henry Street. Gregory King, owner of Outdoor Adventures, began a Home Office in 2001 to be a centrally located office for staff to better service members all over the state. We had about 11,000 members in 2015 and have grown to about 19,000 members in 2020.
The Kresge building is also home to other small businesses, including Hopevale Church, Form & Function, Bayside Home Care, Learman Law, and Bayshore Development.
To read more about our history and how our company has evolved, visit http://www.outdooradventuresinc.com/history/.
Outdoor Adventures spaces inside the Kresge building today:
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