Ridgefield Is Getting a Goodwill Superstore, and the Doors Open September 3

Five days of grand opening hours, free coffee and pastries on day one, and a $100 gift card up for grabs if you can hold onto a postcard for a week.

A postcard showed up in my (and I am sure yours as well) mailbox this week and I am not going to pretend I was cool about it. Ridgefield is getting a Goodwill Superstore. No more donation trailer, not a pop-up, an actual superstore at 121 S 65th Avenue, and the doors open at 8:00 AM on Thursday, September 3.

For anyone who has driven to Salmon Creek or Hazel Dell to thrift because that is what you do when you live in a town this size: congratulations, that commute is over. We now have one on our side of the map.

The grand opening runs five days, Thursday through Labor Day Monday, with extended hours the whole stretch. Here is everything off the mailer.

Do not throw away the postcard

This is the part people are going to mess up, so I am saying it loudly. That mailer is your entry form. Fill in your name and phone number on the back, bring it to the store between September 3 and 7, and drop it in the prize box for a shot at a $100 Goodwill gift card.

Winners get selected by Saturday, September 12, and they will call you. You do not have to be standing there when it happens. If you already recycled yours, do what I would do and ask a neighbor whether theirs is still buried under the grocery ads on the counter.

What opening day is probably going to look like

Every grand opening in this town follows the same arc. The first hour is a line, the next three are a scrum, and by mid-afternoon it settles into something you can actually shop. Thursday runs until 9:00 PM, which is the longest day of the five, so if crowds are not your thing there is a very reasonable window between dinner and close.

Free coffee and pastries are Thursday morning only. That is the reward for showing up at 8:00 AM with the rest of us.

Why this is bigger than a thrift run

This one comes from Goodwill Industries of the Columbia Willamette, the nonprofit that runs stores across Oregon and Southwest Washington. The shorthand on the mailer is Donate. Shop. Make a difference. and the actual mechanism behind that is job training and employment services funded by what happens at the register.

So a superstore in Ridgefield means a few things at once. It means a place to offload the bins in your garage without driving to another town. It means jobs here. And it means the next round of Ridgefield newcomers gets to furnish a house without a Portland run.

For a town that has spent the last several years adding businesses at a pace that makes it hard to keep the guides updated, this one is a genuinely useful addition. You can only have so many places to buy coffee. You cannot have too many places to find a $6 lamp.

Questions you are about to text me

Where exactly is it?

121 S 65th Avenue, Ridgefield, WA 98642.

Can I donate there too?

The mailer does not spell out donation hours or the drop-off setup, so check with the store directly before you load up the car. I will update this post once I confirm.

Do I have to be present to win the gift card?

No. Winners are selected by Saturday, September 12, and notified by phone. Other conditions apply, per the fine print on the card.

Are they open on Labor Day?

Yes. Monday, September 7, 10:00 AM to 8:00 PM.

What are the regular hours after the opening week?

Not listed on the mailer. The September 3 through 7 hours are grand opening hours specifically. I would assume a normal schedule kicks in after that, but do not quote me until I have it in writing.