Wal-Mart adopts smaller focus

It plans to open 90-100 Market stores by February

   Shoppers browse through the produce department at the enterence to the new Walmart Market on 3475 W Black Forest Drive in Fayetteville.
Shoppers browse through the produce department at the enterence to the new Walmart Market on 3475 W Black Forest Drive in Fayetteville.

— Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world’s biggest retailer, plans to accelerate the opening of its midsized Wal-Mart Market stores, said U.S. stores chief Bill Simon.

Wal-Mart will open 90 to 100 of the stores in the year ending in January and have 300 by fiscal 2013, Simon said Tuesday at the William Blair & Co. Growth Stock Conference in Chicago. The stores, formerly known as Neighborhood Markets, are roughly the size of typical supermarkets at about 42,000 square feet.

Wal-Mart is expanding the format because its return on investment in those stores, which now number 185, is comparable to that of its larger supercenters, he said. Wal-Mart has 2,928 supercenters and 696 of its smaller discount stores in the U.S., according to a company fact sheet released in May.

Chief Executive Officer Mike Duke is looking for ways to spur growth as surging gasoline prices curb some customers’ shopping trips.

The company also has introduced smaller Wal-Mart Express shops to appeal to customers who want to complete their shopping quickly. Simon said he is “pleased” with sales at the first two 15, 000-square-foot stores, which opened this month in Gentry and Prairie Grove in Northwest Arkansas. The retailer is opening its third Express store today in North Carolina.

The company plans to open 20 rural and urban Express stores around the U.S. by the end of January. The Express stores will vary in size but will be less than 30,000 square feet and will offer limited grocery selections, general merchandise, and have check-cashing and pharmacy services.

Simon reiterated that Wal-Mart expects to post positive comparable-store sales in the U.S. by the end of the year.

Wal-Mart has posted eight straight quarters of sales declines at U.S. stores open at least a year, a key measure of a retailer’s health.

Wal-Mart posted $418.95 billion in total sales for 2010, a 3.4 percent gain over 2009. Sales at Wal-Mart’s U.S. stores account for almost two-thirds of the company’s total revenue.

Wal-Mart shares fell 59 cents or 1.12 percent to close at $52.32 Wednesday in trading on the New York Stock Exchange. Shares have traded between $47.77 and $57.90 over the past year.

Information for this article was contributed by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette staff.

Business, Pages 27 on 06/16/2011

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