Urban-format big box stores, like Target and Walmart, are popping up in more places

[Cirrus]

A miniature Target is now open in Rosslyn, occupying the ground floor of an office tower. At less than a sixth the size of a typical suburban Target, it shows how retailers are adapting to America's increasing urbanism.




This is, by my count, the Washington region's fourth urban-format Target. The first opened in the 1990s in a suburban town center, and was the testbed for now-familiar urban Target features, like the cart escalator. Then came the big Columbia Heights store in 2008, then our first mini Target earlier this year in College Park MD. Walmart joined the game beginning in late 2013, with urban stores downtown DC and on Georgia Avenue, and a third at Fort Totten Metro set to open this fall.

Meanwhile, Walgreens is expanding its store concept, with bigger "flagship" stores that fill a similar niche to the mini Targets. Walgreens' Chinatown store is almost exactly the same square footage as a mini Target, about 1/6 the sf of a typical full-size Target.

It's an interesting rush to fill the urban discount department store niche, with a lot of experimentation.

Pics:

Rosslyn mini Target:




This is the main entrance. That's it. No giant 50-foot door.



Inside:




Other Targets, Walmarts, and the flagship Walgreens I mentioned above:












Photo from University of Maryland


Photo from Walmart

[Centropolis]

I was in a 3 story flagship style walgreens in center city philly saturday...it seemed more to be a statement of the walgreens brand than any increased functionality. I suppose it took up less horizontal floor space but the central section had a lot of area devoted to escalator and elevator infrastructure. three stories seemed excessive.

[summersm343]

^^Yeah, there are a few urban Walgreens now in Philadelphia, the most notable being at Broad and Chestnut in Center City. There are also two urban Target's planned to open in 2016, one on the 1100 Block of Chestnut and one on the 1900 block of Chestnut. Would like to see an urban Walmart here too.

[mhays]

A Walgreen's in Downtown Seattle just went to two levels, basically doubling the original store. The old store was crowded at checkout despite a handful of similar stores nearby, and had narrow aisles. They might have 1.3 times the actual product capacity but circulation space is way higher per square foot, even outside the escalators. I suspect that theft prevention (sightlines, larger entry area) was a huge reason for the project.

On the main topic, it's interesting to watch retailers attempt multiple strategies to fit into urban areas -- smaller and denser/stacked.

Supermarkets are a similar topic. In a prosperous urban city, land is too expensive for the old store with parking lot format. And those that already exist are sitting on an awful lot of unused value to remain low-intensity forever.

[Emprise du Lion]

It's interesting how this same trend is playing out in Chicago as well. We have various flagship Walgreens in the Loop, and I believe a new flagship CVS is coming as well. We haven't jumped on the mini Target bandwagon just yet though, as even the urban Target on State Street in the Loop is far larger than the Walmart Expresses that can be found in places like River North and Lakeview.

We also have full sized/near full sized Targets and drug stores throughout various neighborhoods in the city as well.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by mhays

A Walgreen's in Downtown Seattle just went to two levels, basically doubling the original store. The old store was crowded at checkout despite a handful of similar stores nearby, and had narrow aisles. They might have 1.3 times the actual product capacity but circulation space is way higher per square foot, even outside the escalators. I suspect that theft prevention (sightlines, larger entry area) was a huge reason for the project.

On the main topic, it's interesting to watch retailers attempt multiple strategies to fit into urban areas -- smaller and denser/stacked.

the philly store was actually quite roomy, cavernous even, and there were way more checkouts than a "normal" walgreens along a single counter. perhaps with three stories they were able to open things up a bit.

[emathias]

Is this really such exciting news?

[Cirrus]

Originally Posted by emathias

Is this really such exciting news?

Does your comment add anything at all to the forum?

If you don't care, ignore it and move on. Personally I think changes to the way we shop in cities, and how retailers are adapting to those changes, is every bit as important as why we can't stop talking about New York in the 1970s, or the fact that the white population is growing, or what your state's outpost is.

[NorthernDancer]

There was a full-sized (140,000 square feet) urban Target under construction in downtown Toronto before Target packed up and left Canada. There was another urban Target in Toronto at The Stockyards development on St. Clair Avenue. I'm not sure if it ever opened or if Target leaving the country was before it had a chance to open.

We do have lots of other urban-format big box retailers though. They're usually "full-sized" and not a smaller version.

[mrnyc]

probably needless to say, but they have them in msp, home of target.

this is a new one i saw in the dinkytown/u of m neighborhood:

[spyguy]

Originally Posted by Emprise du Lion

It's interesting how this same trend is playing out in Chicago as well. We have various flagship Walgreens in the Loop, and I believe a new flagship CVS is coming as well. We haven't jumped on the mini Target bandwagon just yet though, as even the urban Target on State Street in the Loop is far larger than the Walmart Expresses that can be found in places like River North and Lakeview.

We also have full sized/near full sized Targets and drug stores throughout various neighborhoods in the city as well.

There's the new Target Express in Streeterville (replacing Fox & Obel) which apparently sells wine & beer via Starbucks


Yelp

There will be a second store at Clark and Belmont

[Emprise du Lion]

Originally Posted by spyguy

There's the new Target Express in Streeterville (replacing Fox & Obel) which apparently sells wine & beer via Starbucks


Yelp

There will be a second store at Clark and Belmont

I had heard about the boozy Target, but I didn't know that it was going to be an Express. I have heard that people are upset that you can't take the alcohol outside of the Starbucks area though.

As for one on Clark, I had no idea about that one. I'm excited to hear about it because that's fairly close to my apartment.

[toddguy]

I think I would kill a baby to get a mini-Target/Target express along High st. downtown here.

[hammersklavier]

Originally Posted by toddguy

I think I would kill a baby to get a mini-Target/Target express along High st. downtown here.

Fake Fun Facts: Target's demonic patron is Moloch!

[202_Cyclist]

Time to put about four floors of housing above the Columbia Hts Target.

[mrnyc]

Originally Posted by toddguy

I think I would kill a baby to get a mini-Target/Target express along High st. downtown here.

i would bet the farm that will happen within the next 5yrs, probably less.

i have no inside info, but it just makes too much sense.

[gallo]

Originally Posted by Emprise du Lion

We haven't jumped on the mini Target bandwagon just yet though, as even the urban Target on State Street in the Loop is far larger than the Walmart Expresses that can be found in places like River North and Lakeview.

Yes we have, there's a Target Express under construction right now in Lakeview:
http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20150...rman-announces

[Cirrus]

I changed the thread title to be less about DC specifically. It's better this way.

[Austinlee]

This intersection is awesome. I would love to live in a neighborhood that looked about like this.

[dc_denizen]

Thoughts on Edward Bellamy as City Planner: The Ordered Art of Geometry

This is a very old article, but interesting. the topic is the socialist, progressive and utopian novel 'Looking Backward, written in 1888 (and a bestseller in the day), by Edward Bellamy. Looking Backward is about a time traveler observing a future Boston of 2000.

I'm not sure if anyone else has read the book, but Bellamy's utopian future had lots of interesting and prescient aspects, particularly when it came to urban format retail. to wit:

Bellamy saw little of value in retail trade as it was practiced in the late 1800s. He saw the chaos, the mass of people going about the purchase of their daily necessities, and the practice of selling and buying as wasteful: “Stores! Stores! Stores! Miles of stores! Ten thousand stores to distribute the goods needed by this one city.” He then goes on at length about the waste of time, effort, and resources that occurred through the buying and selling process, postulates that the system adds high costs (“…a fourth, a third, a half and more…”), and concludes with the statement, “What a famous process for beggaring a nation!”

Bellamy wanted to eliminate street-fronting storefronts and replace them with a much smaller number of centralized government-run supply depots, similar to these urban format wal marts in many ways.