The Pet Shop is moving its birds, aquarium fish and pet supplies to a new location in Kahului, seeking refuge from high rent and gaining better customer parking, store owner John Guard said Tuesday.

And, the departure of one of the Maui Mall’s original tenants may be just one of the signs of change at the mall in the next few months.

Guard said tenants have been informed that the current owner, Denver-based Alberta Development Partners, is in the process of selling the mall it purchased from Alexander & Baldwin in January 2014. County property tax records indicate that the current owners paid $53.3 million for the 25-acre site.

A couple of other tenants confirmed Tuesday that they’ve also heard that the mall was being sold, but that the sale hadn’t been finalized. Attempts to confirm the sale from Alberta Development or from the mall’s management office were unsuccessful Tuesday.

Meanwhile, after 42 years at the mall, The Pet Shop will close its doors there on Dec. 31 and relocate in the first week of January to the former Kahului Laundromat location at 230 Hana Highway, a warehouselike building with vehicle access off of East Wakea Avenue.

“We are excited,” said Guard, who reported that his business has suffered since Alberta Development purchased the mall with 185,700 square feet of commercial space. “I can’t tell you how bad it’s been in the past two years.

“We’ve gotten in a pretty deep hole. We hope to dig out of it over there,” he said, referring to the new location. “We were looking at the very real possibility of just closing our doors. . . . We knew we were not going to survive.”

According to Guard, Alberta Development began demanding higher rent when it took over, and then there was construction in the old parking lot for the T.J. Maxx store, which opened in the first week of August. Another retail building on the wing of the mall near Kahului Florist and Tasaka Guri Guri has been under construction for months, although it’s now completed but has no tenants.

“That just wiped out our parking,” Guard said.

Now, with the new location and approximately the same amount of space (5,300 square feet), The Pet Shop will have dedicated parking for its customers right at its front door, he said. And, the kicker is that the shop’s rent will be less than half of what Guard is paying at the Maui Mall, he added.

Currently, rent makes up about 20 percent of The Pet Shop’s overhead, he said.

Guard said he understands paying high rent for a premium location, and he had the best location for his business for the past 40 years.

But now, “things have changed,” he said. “The new location will be much more accessible to our business. A number of our customers can’t wait for us to move.”

Already, a few boxes have been moved over to the new location, Guard said, and the Pet Shop’s shelves are beginning to empty.

“We’re already having clearance sales,” he said.

In about two weeks, inventory will stop coming to the Maui Mall location and go instead to the new store, Guard said.

When asked if there was any ill will toward the mall’s owner, Alberta Development, he said the relationship between the owner and tenants didn’t start well when Alberta immediately began raising rents – with no negotiations, he said.

“It started a bad tone with a lot of tenants,” he said.

In 2013, Guard and his wife, Susan, celebrated 40 years at the Maui Mall, where they’ve been selling everything from kitty litter to African spur-thighed tortoises. Originally, the store focused on selling tropical fish and struggled. Later, business improved when it expanded its merchandise to birds, dogs and cats – as well as pet food and supplies.

The store hasn’t sold dogs and cats for about 10 years.

The store has garnered several awards, including the Ho’okela Award for Maui Retailer of the Year in 2007 and a certificate of outstanding achievement awarded by Mayor Alan Arakawa in 2012.

According to the 2012 Hawaii Data Book, the Maui Mall ranked as the Valley Isle’s fourth-largest shopping center – as measured by gross leasable space – behind the Queen Ka’ahumanu Center with 573,000 square feet of shopping area, Maui Marketplace with 315,000 square feet and Lahaina Marketplace with 208,000 square feet.

* Brian Perry can be reached at bperry@mauinews.com.