Posted on: Tuesday, October 5, 2004
Sears plans Waikele hybrid
By Andrew Gomes
Advertiser Staff Writer
Sears, Roebuck and Co. plans to open a new type of store in Waikele next spring where shoppers will be able to buy a refrigerator and the milk that goes in it.
The department store retailer is establishing a chain of stand-alone stores that combine merchandise offerings of a typical mall-based Sears mixed with convenience store and consumable items such as magazines, beauty aids, CDs, juice and frozen pizzas.
Hawai'i will be home to one of the first 56 hybrid stores to be opened by the Hoffman Estates, Ill.-based retailer, which plans to convert 50 recently purchased Kmart stores, including the Waikele store, and six Wal-Mart stores into the new format.
The 120,000-square-foot Hawai'i store at Waikele Center is scheduled to open in March or April following a renovation of the Kmart premises.
Kmart expects to stay open until early next year. Sears has agreed to consider offering Kmart store employees jobs at the new store.
Kmart announced its plan to sell an unidentified group of stores to Sears in June in an effort to raise cash to further strengthen the company that emerged from bankruptcy last year. Sears paid $576 million for the real estate with the idea to expand its chain outside malls.
The new store format, which hasn't been named yet, is a scaled-down version of a freestanding store concept the retailer unveiled a year ago called Sears Grand.
Sears Grand consists of three prototype stores between 160,000 square feet and 200,000 square feet, or roughly twice the size of traditional mall-anchor Sears stores.
The strategy to sell consumables such as books, baby diapers, pet food, cleaning supplies, soup, ice cream and cookies aims to satisfy more shopper needs and better compete against big-box discounters like Wal-Mart, Kmart and Target.
Sears already sells washing machines and clothes — why not laundry detergent as well, the theory of one-stop shopping goes.
"It's the heart and soul of the Sears shoppers love — including the quality brands and services we're known for — with an additional level of convenience and ease," Teresa Byrd, vice president and general merchandise manager for Sears non-mall stores, said in a statement.
The rapid rollout of the mid-size version of Sears Grand is expected to speed expansion of the chain, which has been limited by shopping mall construction, and change the image of the old-line retailer in the minds of many shoppers.
Some retail industry analysts are skeptical that the strategy will be successful because of challenges selling consumables and trying to sell more items found at Wal-Mart.
Sears operates more than 2,300 stores, including about 1,000 full-line stores and 1,300 specialty stores.
Reach Andrew Gomes at agomes@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8065.
