Vacancy posters and for lease signs continue to proliferate in the store windows of Block E, the soon-to-be vacant and once-ballyhooed downtown Minneapolis retail showpiece. Mall owners and city government are finding no buyers in their offer to sell the troubled retail behemoth to take-over mall entrepreneurs. Nonetheless, one development group is planning a serious offer to take over the trouble spot—the Confederacy of Chickens Inc, who plan on converting the pseudo-glitzy complex into an organic chicken coop. To borrow a bit from tradition, the confederacy plans to name their enterprise Cluck E.
“This mall is a very appropriate nurturing environment for raising healthy organic chickens,” say Confederacy representatives. “Rather than being crowded together in the industrialized chicken farms, Cluck E will give these fowl room to roam around in free-range mode, which gives opportunity for a proper chicken life-style growth.” A Confederacy of Chickens spokesperson adds, “This shopping mall architecture was designed to be conducive for small-brain creatures to thrive, so it should work well for chickens.”
