Birchwood BMW MINI expansion underway
By Myron Love
WINNIPEG, MAN. – A $4 million expansion has begun at Birchwood BMW Mini in Winnipeg.
The Pointe West AutoPark dealership will be adding 12,000 square feet to the existing store.
“We have the piles in the ground and we are on schedule,” explained Rene Nicholson, projects manager for the Birchwood Automotive Group.
Nicholson reported that the existing showroom will be converted to house strictly the store’s Mini lineup of products.
“At the existing store, we will be painting everything – the floors, paneling and ceiling – black because black is the colour the manufacturer wants,” he added.
The addition for housing the BMW models will have very high finishes, Nicholson pointed out. “There will be a real wow factor when we are done.”
The new BMW store is scheduled to be ready in about eight months with another three or four months needed to complete the MINI store makeover.
The Birchwood Group is also about to an upgrade to its flagship Chevrolet Buick GMC store.
“We are reimaging the dealership to meet General Motor’s imaging requirements,” he said. “We will be installing all new paneling, erecting a tower and replacing the signage, the furniture and the carpeting.”
The store will also get a new customer reception area, new customer lounge, a new staff lounge and new washrooms.
“We have already installed new LED lighting in the showroom which makes for more consistent lighting,” he said.
That project is expected to cost a little over $1 million. Work is slated to get underway next week and be finished around the end of November.
One other new Birchwood Auto Group project on the drawing board is a new storage compound nearby in Headingly.
“We set a sales record for the Birchwood Group for the month of April and we need to create more space on our current lots for customer and staff parking and serving cars. We bought some land in Headingly and hope to store 500-plus models there. We are waiting on final approvals and hope to begin construction within the next three months.”
The Birchwood Auto Group is Winnipeg’s largest auto group with 15 franchise stores under its umbrella in the city.
