The last tenant sold linens & things and the new tenant sells guns & things. Dick’s Sporting Goods opened in the former Linens & Things space on Lohr Road in mid-October. The company had hoped to be open by September but had to jump one last hurdle first–because it wanted to sell guns, it had to wait for permission from the Pittsfield Township planning commission.

Founded in 1948 by eighteen-year-old Dick Stack as a modest bait-and-tackle shop financed with a $300 loan from his grandmother, Dick’s Sporting Goods is the biggest sporting goods chain in the country with 467 stores nationwide. Though it sells plenty of guns and other hunting supplies, there’s nothing rustic about the Ann Arbor store–with clothing and footwear, team equipment and exercise gear, it’s a glossy palace of physical activity.

If Dick’s had opened last year, customers could have just crossed Ann Arbor-Saline Rd. to comparison-shop shotguns: MC Sports was then located in Oak Valley Center. But MC has moved into Briarwood, to the spot that long housed the center’s movie theaters. Ed Rix, the company’s vice president of marketing, says the seventy-eight-store, Grand Rapids-based chain wanted to add a new department, and needed more space, traffic, and visibility: “Our go-forward strategy is to add hunting and fishing [gear] to all our new locations,” says Rix. “It’s doing extremely well for us.”

Dick’s Sporting Goods, 3120 Lohr Rd. (Waters Place), 733-6095. Mon.-Sat. 9 a.m.-9:30 p.m., Sun. 10 a.m.-7 p.m. dickssportinggoods.com

MC Sports, Briarwood Mall, 996-0404. Mon.-Sat. 9 a.m.-9 p.m. Sun. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. mcsports.com