Sep. 28—BEMIDJI — The company Harbor Freight Tools announced Tuesday, Sept. 28, that it is opening a store in Bemidji's Paul Bunyan Mall.

According to a release, the company will begin operations later this fall, with an official opening date to come at a later time. Construction for the store is underway, and the release says local workers and companies have been hired.

Once open, the store will hire between 25 and 30 new employees. The first Harbor Freight Tools store opened in 1980, and today, the company has 1,200 locations and 24,000 employees.

Harbor Freight Tools is expected to take up space in the former Herberger's location. Herberger's, which took up 56,392 square feet, closed in 2018.

The tools company won't take up the entire space and is instead expected to share the building section with Dunham Sporting Goods. This is the second time in the past decade a former section of the Paul Bunyan Mall has been split.

After Kmart closed in 2012, Hobby Lobby opened in 2015, taking up 55,000 square feet of the supermarket's former space. Then, Kohl's opened in 2016, using up the rest of the space used by the former Kmart, which equated to 35,000 square feet.