By MARC SHAPIRO Staff Writer,
Excerpted from website of The Capital, HomeTownAnnapolis.com
Published March 06, 2008
What does it take to open a Wal-Mart Supercenter?
Take into account years of planning and construction, hiring and training 550 new and transferring employees, making a plan for 4.68 acres of floor space, getting hundreds of signs and fixtures up and finally putting truckload after truckload of food, clothes and other goods on the shelves, and you’re looking at a long process that came to fruition yesterday.
The county’s first Wal-Mart Supercenter – one of the largest single stores in the county – opened yesterday at Quarterfield Crossing in Severn after more than 20 years of work
Brett Guy, a partner with Osprey Property Cos., said the project began as a cooperative venture between his firm and a number of other companies. They acquired the 110-acre site at Quarterfield Road and Interstate 97 in the mid-1980’s, and worked over several years to change the zoning from industrial to retail.
“It moved relatively quickly from that point on,” he said.
Osprey, along with partners Reliable Contracting and Koch & Associates, sank $25 million into the infrastructure at Quarterfield Crossing, which includes utilities, sewers, roads, parking lots and traffic signals. They even relocated a cell phone tower.
Construction by Atlantic Builders Group, which has worked on three other Supercenters in Maryland this year, started in February 2007. Their contract was for $13 million
As Lowes home Improvement, Kohl’s, Chick-Fil-A and other stores opened at the center late last year, work on the Sam’s Club and Wal-Mart continued at its own pace.
At 203,000 square feet, the store isn’t as big as the county’s retail giants. Westfield Annapolis mall covers 1.5 million square feet, while Arundel Mills mall in Hanover is more than 1 million square feet.
Normally, Wal-Mart starts furnishing and stocking its stores six weeks before the doors open to customers, company officials said. But at the Severn Supercenter, that process began just four weeks ago.
Manager Adler Lafontant said 200 to 250 people took two weeks to put displays in place. As many as 25 at a time were working in overnight shifts. At the same time, contractors using a lift were hanging signs that mark different sections of the store and store employees assembled and put up smaller signs. Once displays were in place, shelves and hooks were assembled to make the store ready for its merchandise.
While some products were sent over from the Crain Highway Wal-Mart, as many as two tractor-trailer loads of goods arrived each day, Mr. Lafontant said. Work crews separated and placed the items on shelves. About 15 to 20 truckloads arrived throughout this process, Mr. Lafontant estimated.
The store is 90,000 square feet larger than the Crain Highway Wal-Mart, which closed Tuesday night at 6 pm.
Throughout the setup process, Wal-Mart has been hiring. Of the 300 jobs created, 200 are part-time and 100 are full-time.
These jobs were created by the new departments that opened, which include a grocery store, tire and lube express and one-hour photo lab. Manager positions opened for these departments as well, and 50 employees will work overnight to keep the store open 24 hours.
After going through Wal-Mart’s two – to three-day orientation, new employees were partnered with veterans in their department for hands-on training. For the new departments, associates were trained at the Supercenter in Arbutus.
“We’re extremely excited to embrace the community with this new building,” Mr. Lafontant said.
The store embraced the community Monday night when it handed out $18,000 in charitable contributions to local groups such as the Anne Arundel County Police Department, the Boy Scouts of America, the Salvation Army, St. Bernadette Roman Catholic Congregation and the Glen Burnie Volunteer Fire Company.
“We just want to make sure we take care of customers and the community,” Mr. Lafontant said.