Target plans to take over part of vacant Sears building, town records show
Target wants to open a small-format store in the former Sears space at Lake Success Shopping Center in New Hyde Park. Credit: Newsday/Steve Pfost
Target might be breathing new life into a former Sears store in New Hyde Park.
The discount retailer wants to take over two-thirds of the former Sears in the Lake Success Shopping Center to open a new Target that would include groceries, a CVS pharmacy and Starbucks, according to plans submitted to the town of North Hempstead.
The shopping center’s landlord, Lake Success Shopping Center LLC, has submitted a proposal for renovation work on the cellar and first floor of the vacant three-level space at 1400 Union Tpke. to create an approximately 78,441-square-foot Target.
The plan was initially set to go before North Hempstead's Zoning Board of Appeals on Nov. 13 but it was rescheduled for Jan. 8 at the applicant’s request, town spokeswoman Carole Trottere said.
Conditional-use permits are needed for the grocery component and the Starbucks, town spokeswoman Rebecca Cheng said.
The Sears that was in New Hyde Park was among 46 stores across the country, including some Kmarts, that their struggling former parent company, Sears Holdings Corp., closed in November 2018.
It occupied about 120,000 square feet of space and its lease was to expire at the end of 2019, Kenneth R. Schuckman, president of Schuckman Realty Inc., said in August last year. The Lake Success-based real estate firm represents the shopping center’s landlord.
Schuckman Realty did not respond to requests for comment about the planned Target.
Target Corp. is “not at a point” to share plans for any new stores, but the company is “evaluating opportunities to reach additional guests in New York,” said Liz Hancock, spokeswoman for the Minneapolis-based retailer.
She said Target was focused on increasing its number of small-format stores, "which are smaller than our general merchandise Target stores and are located in dense urban and suburban neighborhoods as well as college campuses."
Of Target’s 1,868 stores, 100 are small-format locations, according to Target’s website.
“Inside each small-format, guests will find many of the categories (like home, apparel, and food and beverage) they’d expect to see in a full-size store, but with smaller assortments curated for their local neighborhood,” the website says.
Full-size Target stores average 130,000 square feet, while small-format stores average about 40,000 square feet.
But Target has opened small-format stores that are much larger than the average size.
In October, the retailer opened an 80,000-square-foot, small-format store in part of a former Sears at Cape Cod Mall in Hyannis, Massachusetts.
In October 2018, Target opened a 60,000-square-foot small-format store in South Burlington, Vermont. It was Target's first small-format store to offer all fulfillment options, including an order pickup counter for online orders, drive up service, and same-day delivery via Shipt.
Of Target’s 26 stores on Long Island, four are small-format locations, including a 54,300-square-foot store that opened last year in Selden.
The closest Target to the former Sears in New Hyde Park is a small-format store 4.1 miles away in Elmont that opened in 2016.
Tory N. Parrish covers retail and small business for Newsday. She has worked at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and Observer-Dispatch in Utica, N.Y.
