Big holes to fill when Wal-Mart moves out

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_page=1208&u_sid=10078742

Big holes to fill when Wal-Mart moves out
BY JOHN KEENAN
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER

Hanging on a lamppost across from the empty store, the sign reads "Wal-Mart Security Cameras in Use."

Well, maybe not.


The empty storefront in the shopping center on 84th Street in La Vista still bears the outline of the Wal-Mart logo, visible, like a stencil, across its blue facade. The store closed in October 2006 when a Wal-Mart Supercenter opened in Papillion's new Market Pointe at 72nd Street and Giles Road.


The empty storefront in the shopping center on 84th Street in La Vista still bears the outline of the Wal-Mart logo, visible, like a stencil, across its blue facade. The store closed in October 2006 when a Wal-Mart Supercenter opened in Papillion's new Market Pointe at 72nd Street and Giles Road.

In that La Vista shopping plaza and others like it, the closing of a Wal-Mart store - often because a new, larger Wal-Mart Supercenter opened nearby - leaves a void.

In the Omaha area alone, two Wal-Marts have closed. And because of the size - the La Vista Wal-Mart space had more than 100,000 square feet - it can be hard to find another occupant.

Wal-Mart Realty's Web site last week listed nine former Wal-Marts available for lease in Nebraska, although company spokesman Ryan Horn said several of them were partially occupied or in the process of being leased.

FULL story at link.

[liberaltrucker]

1. High cost of low prices, indeed

:cry:

[Bobbieo]

2. Wal-Mart is over-extending itself? There are three in Yuma right now

with a 4th one to go on the border at San Luis.Yuma is basically a winter visitor town and the one store closest to me is barely making it. Wonder which one will close first?

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

3. Every time they vacate a property like this...

...they should be required to knock down their ugly store and put a beautiful city park in it's place. This would make them choose sites more carefully and think twice before abandoning them.

[seriousstan]

7. Like every other business, right?

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

9. No, only Wal Mart. nt.

[enid602]

4. Nebraska

Nine empty stores just in Nebraska?

[iamjoy]

5. If I Understand The Situation Correctly

they are closing their older, smaller and uglier Wal-Marts. They are opening a SuperCenter within a few miles of the old store. The SuperCenter is larger than the prior store.

I wouldn't take this as a sign business is bad for them.

Meanwhile, those abandoned stores become suburban blight. Without the Wal-Mart to draw people, many of the smaller stores that were attached to the Wal-Mart (or in the same shopping center) end up closing down. And quite often, the new stores are not in shopping plazas or strip malls but completely free standing.

[SoCalDem]

6. It's how they do it.. They bring in a regular walmart long enough to close

down the pharmacies, children's shops, toy stores, garden centers, shoe stores, & boutiques.. and when those have all closed down, they start in on the grocery stores and the other "medium-sized" box stores, by enlarging or building a bigger super-center..


and leave HUGE ugly empty spaces behind..costing the towns money to patrol & keep clean.

They also ask for and usually get "tax exemption" for a specified asmount of time. (this is the trade off for all those good jobs :eyes:..)

and just when they have to start paying taxes to the community, they move to a close by community and start all over again..

they are parasites.

[WCGreen]

8. In a nutshell...

Target is doing the same thing here on the West Side of Cleveland...

Three new targets in the last two years have opened in a six mile radius...

Another is on the way...

They have abandond one store that will go empty...

Corporate America loves to chase the tax breaks...