A Bellevue 365 by Whole Foods Market store that closed in October will have to reopen, according to a judge's order issued last week.
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A King County Superior Court judge issued a preliminary injunction requiring Whole Foods Market to reopen the store in Bellevue Square, the Seattle Times reports. The shopping mall owners had sued the Amazon-owned grocer for closing the store despite a 20-year lease on the property. The order means Whole Foods will have to reopen the store within 14 days of the order.
Whole Foods had said it closed the store because it was not meeting sales projections. The lease, signed in 2015 for the 34K SF location, required that Whole Foods keep the 365 store open seven days a week for the first 10 years of the lease. Attorneys for Whole Foods had argued that the company continued to pay rent on the property, meeting the terms of its lease.
