Wal-Mart plans to open stores in distressed areas
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. announced Monday that it had selected nine more areas in need of economic revitalization where it plans to open stores in the next two years, including two in California.
Wal-Mart Vice Chairman John Menzer, who heads the company’s U.S. operation, was traveling to Indianapolis and Pittsburgh to announce that the company was moving into neighborhoods in each of those cities where commerce had faltered.
Menzer said Wal-Mart was working with local chambers of commerce, business groups and minority-owned businesses with the goal of guiding new suppliers and helping new or existing shops thrive.
“We’re looking at working families that need us the most,” Menzer said. “That’s where we want to go.”
As jobs are created around the new Wal-Mart stores, tax revenue will rise and the neighborhood economy will improve, Menzer said.
In April, Wal-Mart Chief Executive H. Lee Scott Jr. said the Bentonville, Ark.-based company planned to build 50 stores in areas with high crime or high unemployment.
At each of the stores, five small businesses will be picked each quarter for special treatment, the ultimate focus of which will be “how to take advantage of having a Wal-Mart in your market,” Menzer said.
The first store to participate in the retail giant’s “opportunity zone” initiative was a Wal-Mart already open on the West Side of Chicago. Menzer said a number of new businesses were under development nearby, including a coffee shop, a drugstore and a home improvement center.
In Indianapolis, a Wal-Mart Supercenter is to open next year in Lafayette Square. A Supercenter combines a Wal-Mart discount store with a grocery store.
A Supercenter is also planned for a site near Pittsburgh, at East Hills, Pa. The new Wal-Mart there is to open in 2009.
Other stores announced Monday:
* Richmond, Calif. -- A Wal-Mart is to open in the spring at a former department store location in the Bay Area community.
* Sanger, Calif. -- A Supercenter is to open in the spring at a former commercial building in the community near Fresno.
* Cleveland -- A Supercenter is to open in the fall at the site of a former steelyard.
* Decatur, Ga. -- The community outside of Atlanta is to get a Supercenter in early 2008 at the site of a former mall.
* El Mirage, Ariz. -- A Supercenter is to open during the summer near Luke Air Force Base.
* Landover Hills, Md. -- The first Wal-Mart inside the Washington Beltway is to open in the spring at the former Capital Plaza Shopping Center.
* Portsmouth, Va. -- A Supercenter opened last month in the city’s midtown at an area targeted for redevelopment.
