Georgia Town Relieved Its Kmart Was Spared
When Kmart Corp. announced last month that it was closing 326 stores nationwide -- including 15 in Georgia -- as part of a reorganization plan to escape bankruptcy, fears that Bainbridge might be on the list spread from City Hall to the Chamber of Commerce.
“It worried us a lot, to be honest,” City Manager Chris Hobby said. “Kmart’s the only show in town. It’s made us a shopping hub for towns that surround us, and it keeps local residents from driving to Tallahassee [Fla.] or Dothan [Ala.] to spend their money.”
Bainbridge’s Kmart was not among those targeted for closing, and Hobby, for one, was relieved -- for social as well as economic reasons:
“Kmart’s a gathering point. You go there, you see friends, and maybe you end up eating together at the Chinese or Mexican restaurant in the shopping center,” Hobby said. “There’s no place else in town like that.”
In embracing a superstore, Bainbridge has turned its back on a decade-old movement to keep such chains as Kmart, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Target Corp. out of small towns, where opponents say their presence hurts downtown merchants and their hangar-size buildings are ugly and difficult to fill if the tenant moves out.
But in places such as Bainbridge (population 11,000), they are seen as an asset that goes beyond low prices, jobs and a boost to the tax base. Residents and officials say they are social institutions, where friends chat while shopping, and where folks go in the summer when their home air-conditioning breaks down.
In a sense, supporters say, they are what a minor league baseball team was in the 1940s and the first fast-food franchise in a community was in the 1960s: a sign that a town has been elevated from outback status.
The Kmart here sprawls over an area the size of a football field on Business Route 84, in what was a residential district 30 years ago. Sharon Harrell made her way through the aisles recently as the voice of Fats Domino singing “I’m Walkin’ ” filled the store. A woman’s amplified voice broke in: “Attention, Kmart shoppers. The shopper looking for a small bag of wild birdseed, it’s waiting for you in the garden shop.”
“If we ever lost our Kmart, I’d have to go to Cairo [Ga.] to do my shopping, and that’s 30 miles,” Harrell said. “I can get everything I need here, from my husband’s cigarettes to Pampers and clothes for the kids, to groceries and bicycles, to Martha Stewart’s line. In some ways, Kmart put Bainbridge on the map.”
Kmart corporate officials would not disclose the store’s revenue or the size of its payroll. Nor would they let journalists take pictures or interview employees in the store. But Bainbridge officials say Kmart, the town’s largest retailer, accounts for a sizable proportion of the $1.7 million in sales taxes they collect annually, and they estimate the store’s yearly sales at more than $15 million.
“A Kmart is important to a small town in lots of ways,” said Cile Warr, president of the chamber here. “One of them is that it tends to attract other retailers. You look at Dothan, across the Alabama border. Applebee’s came in and pretty soon Outback, the LongHorn Steak House and Red Lobster are there too. Retailers tend to follow each other, and now Dothan isn’t a small town anymore.”
But enthusiasm is hardly universal. An increasing number of citizen groups and city councils across the nation complain that overstuffed retail stores lead to a homogenization of rural landscapes, a deterioration of historic commercial centers and reduced quality of life because of traffic and pollution.
Al Norman, a lobbyist in Greenfield, Mass., became an activist in 1993 when Wal-Mart tried to move into his hometown. The retailer ended up looking elsewhere, and Norman has spent a good part of his time since then writing and speaking out against Wal-Mart and the spread of superstores.
“America,” he said, “is drowning in retail glut.”
Norman has compiled a list of 164 communities, from Reedley, Calif., to Saugus, Mass., that have thwarted the plans of “big-box stores” to open outlets, or forced developers to withdraw. Although some of the stores eventually did open, Norman believes that the grass-roots campaign has slowed the sprawl he blames on the Wal-Marts, Targets and Kmarts.
Kmart, an offspring of Sebastian Kresge’s five-and-dimes, opened its first store in 1962 and grew into a mega-retailer with more than 1,800 stores and more than 230,000 employees. But in recent years it has failed to compete with Wal-Mart’s low prices and Target’s trendier merchandise. Last year, Kmart lost $2 billion and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection from its creditors. It plans to emerge from bankruptcy leaner and smaller, with about 1,500 stores.
While Kmart foundered, Wal-Mart grew into the world’s largest retailer, with 3,332 stores in the United States, more than 1,200 overseas and annual revenue near $250 billion. The chain accounts for 8% of all U.S. retail sales, excluding restaurants and auto dealers.
Some analysts question whether Kmart has a future. Arun K. Jain, an expert in marketing and retailing and a professor at the University at Buffalo, the State University of New York, says the retailer’s best chance for survival may be to become a sort of Woolworth’s, with trimmed-down outlets that offer less than a Wal-Mart and more than a neighborhood store.
“The challenge for Kmart is to think nationally and act locally,” Jain said.
“In smaller towns without competition, they may be OK. But Kmart can’t compete on the same terms with Wal-Mart everywhere. Wal-Mart is just too big. If Kmart continues trying to be all things to all shoppers, Wal-Mart will rip them up.”
Whatever the firm’s future, few here would disagree with Jean Wingard, who has worked at a furniture store in downtown Bainbridge for 52 years.
“We’re lucky to have kept our Kmart,” she said. “Yes, it takes some business from us, but its overall impact is a big plus. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t shop there.”
