Wal-Mart is coming to Dallas. The grocery store variation of the large chain store is set to be built along Dallas Cherryville Highway near U.S. 321.
Last week, Wal-Mart officially bought a little more than 20 acres at 1300 Dallas Cherryville Highway from the Best family. The land had been in the family since 1899, according to county tax records. Wal-Mart paid $650,000 for the lot, which had a tax value of more than $1 million.
The corporation plans to build a new Wal-Mart Neighborhood Market. Wal-Mart Neighborhood Markets are smaller than the typical “supercenter.” The stores carry only grocery items, meat, produce, dairy and general merchandise and have a drive through pharmacy.
Dallas Town Manager Jim Palenick expects construction to start sometime in late spring or early summer. Complete site plans have already been approved and bids for construction are being accepted.
Around 95 full- and part-time employees are typically hired for Wal-Mart Market stores. Wal-Mart spokesman Bill Wertz said the company expects the same for the Dallas store. Wal-Mart could open late this year.
Now that the plans are being finalized, only a few questions remain. One is how the big box store’s smaller grocery chain will fit into the Dallas market, Palenick said.
The store is set to go up just minutes from two other grocery stores — an Ingles and a Food Lion. “It’s really hard to say,” Palenick said. “We have a large Ingles grocery store in town and a Food Lion, so we already have several aspects of the grocery market covered. But we’re going to reserve judgment for now.”
Wertz said the grocery stores have been popular so far. “We are always looking for locations where we can make shopping more convenient and affordable for our customers,” he said. “We look basically for gaps where we don’t have stores and where we receive input from customers where they’d like to see us locate a store.”
Dallas fit. “It’s a great community and I think the store will be welcome,” he said.
Opposition to Market in Gastonia: Wal-Mart Neighborhood Markets are also in the works for Kings Mountain and Gastonia. The Kings Mountain store is scheduled to open in November or December. Some residents raised opposition to the store coming to Gastonia. The lot where the new store is expected to go, Eastwood Village along South New Hope Road, had to be rezoned for the grocery store.
Before the vote, several residents spoke out against the extra traffic they expected to see in the already crowded area. Developers prevailed, however, and plans call for the new store at the intersection of South New Hope Road and Redbud Drive.
You can reach reporter Lauren Baheri at 704-869-1842 or Twitter.com/lbaheri.