By Jennifer Glickel
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
SOHO — Flooding on the second floor of Uniqlo, the popular and inexpensive Japanese clothing store in SoHo, forced the shop to open two hours late Tuesday, leaving nearly 200 customers waiting outside.
Uniqlo's flagship store at 546 Broadway, which usually opens at 10 a.m., opened at noon after a pipe broke in an apartment on the building's third floor and water leaked down into the store below.
"It was really wet when we came in this morning," said a Uniqlo representative, who declined to give his name.
"It was like it was raining inside," he added.
Customers lined up outside the store's front entrance on Broadway, between Prince and Spring streets, and roughly 175 people poured in when the doors opened at noon.
"I came by around 11 expecting it to be open, but saw the sign in the window saying they were flooded," said customer Tony Barddot, 32, who was in the market for a new coat.
"I didn't want to wait around, so I went to some other stores and then came back at noon, and there was a big line of people going in."
Using water vacuums and mops, the store's contractors took a few hours to clean up the affected area in the men's clothing section.
