Target Eyes Fayetteville

by Talk Business & Politics ([email protected]) 361 views 

Target Corp. is looking to open a store in Fayetteville, but the retailer said that won’t happen this year.

“Target is very interested in Fayetteville and pursuing opportunities in the area, but it is preliminary to confirm any specific plans at this point,” said Kristin Jahnke, a spokeswoman for the company. “We are interested in the market.”

The Northwest Arkansas Times of Fayetteville recently reported that Target is expected to build a store in the city’s CMN Business Park, but Target won’t confirm that, and no plans for the construction were filed with the Fayetteville Planning Commission as of March 13.

“I don’t have specific information about a site,” Jahnke said.

Jahnke said Target has already announced all its store openings for 2001, but a Fayetteville store could be opened next year. She said it takes about 10 months to build a store.

Target is based in Minneapolis and refers to itself as a “upscale discount retail” chain. The company has 992 stores in 46 states.

Target has three store sizes: the traditional store, 125,000 SF; Target Greatland, 135,000 SF; and SuperTarget (which also sells groceries), 177,000 SF. Target also operates 266 Mervyn’s stores and 64 Marshall Field’s stores.

For the fiscal year ended Feb. 3, Target had sales of $1.26 billion, or $1.38 a share, up about 7 percent from earnings of $1.19 billion, or $1.27 a share, before an extraordinary charge of $41 million in the previous year.