Target at SW 44 and S. Western

[SoonerDave]

i believe that trade mart was at i-240 & shields. -M

Nope. That was Woolco.

[Martin]

"The South Target opened in the early 70's and in 2004 about a third of the 137,630 square feet were subdivided and leased to Westlake Hardware."

i'm pretty certain that westlake hardware was already split out in the 1980's... while not certain, i could believe that in 2004 that westlake partnered with ace.

-M

[Bobby821]

I can't believe that Sears is going to last much longer.

Monstrous parking lot that is virtually empty every time I go by.

That property is owned by Sears and has been paid for for a long time so there is no rent on the property or building

[Martin]

Nope. That was Woolco.

you're right... like you said, trade mart was where service merchandise was at i-240 and penn. -M

[Pete]

That property is owned by Sears and has been paid for for a long time so there is no rent on the property or building

Same with the Target we are discussing.

[SoonerDave]

I can't believe that Sears is going to last much longer.

Monstrous parking lot that is virtually empty every time I go by.

What many here may not realize is that there was a time when that particular Sears was popular enough such that they *really needed* that big parking lot! As a kid, Sears was one of my family's routine haunts. They sold furniture, organs, pianos, carpet, hardware (good hardware), toys (especially at Christmas), clothes, lawn/garden equipment, and had a big shoe area - heck, they were WalMart without the requisite layer of "crappy." And they had the *huge* catalog sales business to boot - they were arguably Amazon before Amazon and the Internet.

That 44th Sears also had a coffee/snack shop, a candy counter (that included fresh roasted peanuts that made the place smell AWESOME the moment you walked in), always had a demo Craftsman garage door opener up and running along with a demo PONG video game available for the kids (like me) to play. Back in that era it was across the street from a thriving Reding Square center. Ahh, how times have changed.

[Pete]

^

Yes, just like the one that used to stand at 23rd & Penn, which was my family's go-to place for almost everything back in the late 60's and early 70's.

It was fun to go as a kid.

But of course, the one on 23rd was demolished some time ago.

[SoonerDave]

"The South Target opened in the early 70's and in 2004 about a third of the 137,630 square feet were subdivided and leased to Westlake Hardware."

i'm pretty certain that westlake hardware was already split out in the 1980's... while not certain, i could believe that in 2004 that westlake partnered with ace.

-M

Absolutely correct. The space occupied by Westlake was *expanded* from the space Target used to operate as a grocery store waaay back in the 70's (details in an earlier post)

[bchris02]

When I was growing up this was the only Target on the south side. You didn't have the one in Moore or the one in Norman, which was closer to where I lived at the time than SW 44th. It's sad to see it closing. My guess is Sears will be next. The south side between I-240 and I-40 has lost so much since the 1990s. I seem to remember when SW 29th St was a more viable retail corridor than it is today.

[Pete]

They did build on but the hardware store also took part of Target's space when the entire store/center was reconfigured around that new construction.

[Pete]

[Martin]

i love digging around for this kind of stuff... just found an article from 1983 that states that westlake ace hardware will open "2 new stores ... adjacent to existing target stores"... so they did something similar at the target on midwest blvd in midwest city. i don't remember the "ace" part being prominently displayed in the 1980's... as a kid i remember the westlake logo looked awfully similar to the warner brothers logo of that era, which is why i remember it. -M

[BlackmoreRulz]

Ah well, you guys may be right, it was a long time ago. But it just seems that was the name of it, we used to go to this Trade Mart in Del City well before the 74th st store opened

[baralheia]

That property is owned by Sears and has been paid for for a long time so there is no rent on the property or building

Well, not really anymore - Sears started and spun off a real estate investment trust company called "Seritage SRC Finance, LLC" to hold a lot of Sears' real estate assets. According to the County Assessor, the property that the Sears store is on was sold to Seritage last July. When interviewed by the Memphis Business Journal about a few Sears stores in Memphis sold under similar circumstances, Sears said that they expected to continue to operate these stores sold to Seritage under a leaseback agreement, but that Sears has no control over Seritage (Source: Sears Memphis building sell-off part of retail land rush).

[Soonerman]

I wonder if Target is going to build a new store out by the airport. I can't see them closing without building a new Southside store.

[bchris02]

I wonder if Target is going to build a new store out by the airport. I can't see them closing without building a new Southside store.

I think if they did a new southside store, they might prefer to be on I-240. SW 44th and Western is somewhat off the beaten path these days unless you live in that area. An I-240 store would probably be much busier.

[baralheia]

There's not a whole lot of vacant land near I-240... best area of clear land for a store of that size looks like the area between Shields and Santa Fe, roughly between I-240 and SE 66th St.

[SoonerDave]

There's not a whole lot of vacant land near I-240... best area of clear land for a store of that size looks like the area between Shields and Santa Fe, roughly between I-240 and SE 66th St.

If WalMart even spectulated closing their big store, I can't imagine Target trying to build new in that general area. Somewhere around the new Portland development near the Airport makes a lot of sense, excepting for its proximity to the big Target in Moore....don't know how close together Target wants its stores.

[baralheia]

The Walmart at I-240 and Santa Fe is constantly busy. They do a huge amount of business there. If they're thinking of closing their store there, I think the only real reason would be to mitigate shrinkage - as I understand it, that store stopped being 24-hour because there was a high amount of loss to theft during the overnight hours. Target doesn't operate any 24-hour stores in OKC, so to my mind this would be less of an issue for them.

[Pete]

This target was only moderately busy when I would visit, which is one of the reasons I preferred it.

Target has been re-trenching for a while so I bet this store did okay, just not well enough.

[RedSoxFan]

What does CVS expanding into Target stores have to do with the closing of this particular store? I don't see the correlation.

[Pete]

What does CVS expanding into Target stores have to do with the closing of this particular store? I don't see the correlation.

There isn't one other than the fact Target is making a bunch of wholesale business changes as it retrenches a bit.

Store closings are part of that overall strategy.

[seaofchange]

If WalMart even spectulated closing their big store, I can't imagine Target trying to build new in that general area. Somewhere around the new Portland development near the Airport makes a lot of sense, excepting for its proximity to the big Target in Moore....don't know how close together Target wants its stores.

I drive from 19th Street to Meridian/I-40 for work, and it takes roughly 15-20 minutes to actually get to Portland/Airport Road from 19th Street in Moore, depending on the time of day, so I think the Portland/Airport development would definitely be a great fit for a new one. It seems close but really is comparable, if not farther away than the Moore-Norman locations.

[stile99]

I can't believe that Sears is going to last much longer.

Monstrous parking lot that is virtually empty every time I go by.

There is absolutely no reason it hasn't already folded up...I think it is a zombie. Or maybe a good setting for Fallout 5.

[BBatesokc]

...
BTW, that location is *not* a Super Target. Never has been.

...

I guess I just consider every Target with groceries a 'Super Target.' Maybe they all have groceries now. Not sure. I never buy food there.