As one state Target opens, another sees drop in foot traffic
In the 8 a.m. hour on Monday, Target shelf stockers had plenty of elbow room to unload their carts in the aisles of the retailer’s new store in Danbury Fair mall. Less than five miles up Interstate 84 at Target’s Bethel store on the Danbury town line, it was pretty much the same scene.
About the only difference? A solitary shopper was at checkout in the Danbury store, whereas Target shoppers in Bethel had to wait a minute or two to get their carts rung up. But that balance could shift toward Danbury before long, if shopper visits to the two stores in April are any indication.
From just over 30,000 visits the first week of April, Target’s Bethel store saw its visitor count drop to about 22,000 visits two weeks later, according to aggregated mobile phone location data reported by Placer.ai. The drop in foot traffic at its Bethel store coincided with Target’s grand opening of its new store at Danbury Fair mall.
Placer.ai tracks precise locations of mobile phones, but does not distinguish between shoppers, store employees or external vendors visiting any one property. While Placer.ai carves out Target foot traffic from malls nationally, including for the Connecticut Post Mall, Trumbull Mall and Enfield Square, it has yet to do so for Danbury Fair mall.
Target opened at Danbury Fair mall on April 9, several days ahead of the opening date it had publicized. The store occupies the lower wing of the former Sears section of the mall, which had been empty for five years. It’s situated below discount apparel store Primark which in 2016 took over the upper level of Sears.
Fully staffed, Target anticipates about 300 people working at the Danbury
Fair mall store, which has a similar amount of floor space compared to its Bethel location on Stony Hill Road.
Danbury Fair mall drew nearly 14,000 more shoppers the first full week that Target was open at the mall, according to Placer.ai, only to see visits tail back off to previous levels the following week
of just above 140,000 visitors for the week. It’s unknown how many of those mall shoppers stepped foot inside Target, or if they would have hit the mall that week either way.
A corporate spokesperson with Target said the company does not share traffic data for specific stores, and offered no comment on the decline in
April foot traffic at the Bethel store. A nearby Walmart location just across the Danbury line on Newtown Road registered a slight increase in visits in the Placer.ai data, and a review of other Target locations in the area did not see nearly as large a variances in visitations in April as the Bethel store.
Target is also adding a Norwalk store on Connecticut Avenue, taking over a former Walmart as construction proceeds a short distance away on Wegmans first store in Connecticut. The Norwalk store is one of nearly 40 in the works that will edge Target close to the 2,000-store milestone.
“We’re excited to bring an easy, affordable and convenient shopping experience to new guests in the Norwalk community with this new Target store,” stated Target spokesperson Loni Monroe in an email. “As we get closer to opening the store, we’ll have more specific details to share.”
Meanwhile, foot traffic is strolling along in Danbury.
At midday on May 6, a quiet Monday at Danbury Fair, about 20 people were at the new Round1 Bowling & Arcade entertainment venue, and another 75 were at the mall’s food court with its centerpiece fairgrounds carousel.
About 75 people were shopping in the noon hour in the aisles of Target as well — with no small number of New York license plates on vehicles in the parking lot — as the department store hits its one month in business mark this Thursday at Danbury Fair.
“At the end of the day, it’s really more visits, longer ‘dwell’ time in our centers,” said new Macerich CEO Jack Hsieh, speaking last week on a conference call. “It’s not just providing acres and shops, but it’s really trying to make a difference on what our customers need and want.”