Bed Bath & Beyond Is Returning to a State It Once Vowed to Avoid

Less than a year after vowing never to do business in California again, Bed Bath & Beyond is coming back.

The retailer announced Thursday that it will relaunch in the state by rebranding 98 locations of The Container Store, including 12 in California. The new format—“The Container Store + Bed Bath & Beyond”—will combine the chain’s traditional organizational products with Bed Bath & Beyond’s home goods assortment.

The transition begins Friday, with store layouts expected to shift starting in May. As part of the overhaul, roughly 30 percent of The Container Store’s existing categories will be liquidated to make room for the expanded merchandise mix.

“This is a reset with purpose,” Jen Pape, senior vice president of The Container Store, said in the statement. “We are actively reshaping our stores to make room for what’s next.”

The move marks a sharp reversal from last summer, when executive chairman Marcus Lemonis said the company would avoid California altogether following its 2023 bankruptcy and store closures. At the time, Bed Bath & Beyond shuttered all 80 of its California locations.

Lemonis framed the decision as economic, not political, pointing to what he described as a costly and restrictive business environment. “It’s a system that makes it harder to employ people, harder to keep doors open, and harder to deliver value to customers,” he wrote in a post on X in August.

California Governor Gavin Newsom pushed back at the time, mocking the retailer’s relevance after its collapse. He wrote on X,  “Like most Americans, we thought Bed, Bath & Beyond no longer existed.”