New Bath & Body Works store in Pierce County cancels plans to open this fall
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Bath & Body Works canceled plans to open a store in Gig Harbor’s Olympic Village.
- Company encouraged shoppers to visit Tacoma Mall and Tacoma Central stores instead.
- Permit review had outstanding revisions, and the application will expire Nov. 24, 2025.
New fragrances won’t be coming to Gig Harbor’s Olympic Village shopping center after all, the Bath & Body Works media relations team told The News Tribune Friday.
“We’ve made the decision to no longer move forward with this location,” the email read Friday. “We encourage shoppers to visit our other Bath & Body Works stores at Tacoma Mall and Tacoma Central.”
The media relations team, which did not provide an individual spokesperson’s name, did not respond Friday afternoon to questions about the reason for the decision and whether Bath & Body Works would consider revisiting a Gig Harbor location in the future.
The News Tribune reported earlier this year that Bath & Body Works submitted a permit application May 28 to move into part of a larger building that used to house Fred Meyer Marketplace. A Bath & Body Works spokesperson then told a reporter that the projected opening date was in October 2025.
The city of Gig Harbor’s public permit portal indicates that the city’s planning and engineering divisions approved the company’s application to make tenant improvements at the site. Staff were waiting for application revisions in early July following reviews by the Building and Fire Safety Division and Building & Fire Admin.
Gig Harbor Community Development Director Eric Baker confirmed Nov. 12 that city staff reviewed the proposal and left comments that needed to be addressed before the review could proceed.
The application expires Nov. 24. Once an application expires, an applicant who wishes to apply again must resubmit and restart the process, according to Baker.
Bath & Body Works sells “fine fragrance mist, body lotion and body cream, 3-wick candles, home fragrance diffusers and liquid hand soap” in stores across the U.S., Canada and other countries worldwide, according to the company website.
This story was originally published November 17, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
