Target May Be Set To Debut A New ‘Store Of The Future’
“Store of the Future,” like it or not, is a meaningless term, one trapped in a 20th century construct. The word, “store,” can now mean many different things to many different use cases.
In reality, Domino’s Pizza is all those things. Its stores are stores, restaurants, production facilities, and distribution centers all rolled into one. Even though Domino’s Pizza has been around since the 1960s, in many ways, it was also one of the first companies built for the modern age.
As a result, many retailers are now trying to make like Domino’s and pushing themselves to challenge all the varying degrees to which their stores can function.
For example, just a few weeks ago, Walmart announced that it plans to open a bevy of local automated fulfillment centers within its stores, along with automated pickup points in its parking lots, to pick and pack online orders more efficiently and to get them into customers' cars even faster.
All of which sounds a lot like ordering a pizza.
But there is one company that may even put Walmart’s plans to shame — Target. Recent evidence suggests that Target may be reimagining what the word “store” means to an even greater degree than everyone else.
Last year Target purchased a 400,000-square-foot building in Northeast Minneapolis for $17.4 million. At the time, the surmised rationale behind the purchase, according to city documents reviewed by the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal, was that Target planned to build a new photo studio on the property. Nick Halter, the writer of the article, had asked Target for comment on the intended use for the building at the time, but Target declined to provide any additional information to him.
