Lowe’s to take over two former Target locations
Home improvement chain Lowe’s Canada is taking over two Calgary store locations recently vacated by Target.
Property owner RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust, in a release Wednesday, said Lowe’s will open in the Shoppes at Shawnessy and at Signal Hill Centre.
The future of four other former Target locations — Forest Lawn, Sunridge Mall, Chinook Centre and Market Mall — has not been announced.
Lowe’s, which already has three Calgary- area stores — at CrossIron Mills, Sunridge and McKenzie — acquired the leases for 13 former Target stores in Ontario at auction last month. The North Carolina- based company, which has 38 stores across Canada, including seven in Alberta, declined to comment on Wednesday’s announcement.
“We’re unable to comment specifically about the information RioCan released, however, we are working through the customary contingencies and expect to close transactions for the former Target locations by June 30,” Karen Cobb, manager of corporate public relations for Lowe’s Companies, Inc., wrote in an email.
“Lowe’s carefully evaluated the available sites and bid on locations that we believe best complement our existing store base or provide access to new markets where we believe the Lowe’s brand and offering will be well received.”
Target announced in January that it would close all of its 133 stores across Canada, less than two years after entering the country. The closures, completed in April, resulted in more than 17,000 layoffs.
“The remaining four vacant Target locations in Calgary will likely take longer to re- merchandise and recycle with new tenants as the sites are complicated and involve redevelopment and densification,” said retail analyst Michael Kehoe of Fairfield Commercial Real Estate Inc.
“The recycling of the 133 Target stores across Canada will be the largest retail remerchandising and re- leasing event in Canadian history and is likely to take several years to complete.”
John Moss, vice- president in retail sales and leasing for CBRE Limited in Calgary, said most of Target’s real estate in Canada was good.
“The assignment to Lowe’s gives the home improvement store instant market penetration rather than waiting for the next power centre development in the area,” he said. Moss said Canadian Tire, Loblaws and Walmart are in the hunt for the remaining Target properties.
RioCan said five other former Target locations in Canada have been assigned to Lowe’s — Victoria, Toronto, Ottawa, Abbotsford and Burlington — and one in Sudbury to Canadian Tire.
“While the transactions in each of these cases have received court approval, whether those transactions are successfully completed in the case of the RioCan locations may depend on certain additional approvals being obtained,” it said.
The Herald earlier this week reported the former 1.3- millionsquarefoot Target distribution centre in the Balzac area has been sold to Sobeys for $ 50 million.