JACKSON WAL-MART STORE TO EXPAND TO SUPERCENTER

JACKSON -- The Jackson Wal-Mart store will relocate to a Wal-Mart Supercenter to be built further east on East Jackson Boulevard.

Construction of the store is scheduled to begin in August. The grand opening is expected in spring 1999.

The store at 2001 E. Jackson Blvd. covers 34,450 square feet. The new store will be 109,000 square feet, the size that is the smallest of the chain's Supercenters. It will be built just east of Julian's Restaurant, about one and one-half miles from the I-55 interchange.

No matter what their size, all Supercenters have 36 general merchandise departments, including a pharmacy and grocery area.

The announcement was made Monday by Wal-Mart Stores in Bentonville, Ark.

The company intends to add 150 employees to its current staff of 80.

Jackson Mayor Paul Sander expects other businesses to be drawn to the area. A new Cape Mercantile Bank already is scheduled to be built across the highway from the new Wal-Mart.

"It will be a tremendous amount of convenience for shoppers," Sander said. "And we will immediately see other retail stores and possibly a strip mall.

"It's like a magnet," Sander said. "I've had numerous people from different retail businesses ask questions."

Keith Morris, a spokesman for Wal-Mart Stores Inc., said the traffic a Wal-Mart Supercenter generates typically draws restaurants, dry cleaners, banks and similar businesses.

The decision to expand Wal-Mart's store in Jackson resulted in part from its continued success after the larger regional Supercenter opened in Cape Girardeau. The Cape Girardeau store is 175,000 square feet.

Jackson's continued growth as a community was another factor.

Though the Cape Girardeau and Jackson stores will be only a few miles apart, Morris said the proximity of one Supercenter to another is not as important as traffic patterns, competition and growth projections.

He said the 180,000-square-foot Supercenter at the corporate headquarters in Bentonville is only four miles from the 175,000-square-foot Supercenter in Rogers. Bentonville has a population of 11,000, Rogers a population of 30,000.

Only the most successful Wal-Mart stores are considered for conversion to Supercenters, Morris said. "It's a compliment to the hard work of our associates."

He said a tenant will be sought for the building to be vacated.