Fire destroyed Zup's grocery store in Babbitt and an adjoining drug store. The Duluth News Tribune reports three other businesses suffered water damage. The total damage is estimated at $1 million.

After more than seven years of planning, Lunds finally opened its new 20,000 square-foot grocery and liquor store Thursday in downtown Minneapolis. This fall, Golden Valley-based Steele Fitness plans to open what it believes is "Minnesota's first rooftop training space" above the new Lunds grocery store.

Stores in Ridgedale in Minnetonka, Southdale in Edina and Shoppes at Arbor Lakes in Maple Grove are all reportedly slated to close late this month.

Shoppers in the Fargo area are finding fliers supporting the locked-out workers near the company's products on local store shelves. One store owner says union members are planting the leaflets, not store employees.

The women's clothing company based in Plymouth says it plans to close the stores by the end of January and will also lay off employees at its corporate office.

That's close to one out of every three stores. The Minneapolis St. Paul Business journal says there's no word yet if any of the 16 Gap stores in Minnesota will be affected.

A moose, far astray from its north woods Minnesota habitat, has been plodding around the southern part of the state. It was recently spotted near Winthrop, roughly 80 miles southwest of the Twin Cities, the Mankato Free Press reports. “Generally, it’s young bulls who do this," a DNR biologist said. "They just have a lot of wander in them.”

The Post Bulletin reports Astrup Drug, Inc., is buying six Witt Pharmacy shops in southeast Minnesota and one in Iowa. Astrup Drug already operates 11 Sterling Drug stores and Smart Pharmacies.