Brooklyn Center Target to Close in February
The city of Brooklyn Center will soon one of its key retailers. The Target store, located at 6100 Shingle Creek Parkway, will close Feb. 2, reportedly because of declining profits at that particular location.
“It’s always sad to see a store that offers so much leave a neighborhood,” said Tim Tape, a Brooklyn Center resident.
For city leaders, the Target closure is a tough pill to swallow.
“Overall disappointed,” said Brett Angell, Brooklyn Center’s business and workforce development specialist. “You never want to see a business close, especially one that employs over 100 employees.”
“We want to see our residents being lifted economically, so we definitely don’t want to lose jobs that are in the community already,” said April Graves, a Brooklyn Center City Council member. “We want to be bringing more to the community.”
Shoppers Sad to See It Go
The Brooklyn Center Target has been around since 1986 and has a loyal core of shoppers. Most were bummed out to hear the news.
“This is kind of like the anchor of this little location here,” said Bob Wargin of Brooklyn Center,”so I really hate to see it go.”
“A little bit bummed,” said Erin Boogs of Minneapolis. “It’s the one I come to most often. It’s kind of a bummer that it’s closing.”
City officials say they would like Target to stay in the neighborhood and would even consider a new location for the store in the future. However, they feel this one was neglected.
“When you look at the metro region you see a lot of the stores have done multiple new upgrades and this store hadn’t received those,” Angell said. “We would have loved to see that.”
The closest Target locations to Brooklyn Center will be approximately 10 minutes away in Crystal and Fridley. This will make things tougher on residents who don’t have transportation.
“I’m sure there’s a number of people that depend on this store,” Tape said. “I’m sure there are a lot of people that will be dinged quite a bit by this.”
Image Hit
The news stings even more because Target is a Minneapolis-based company.
“We’re right in their back yard,” Angell said.
Plus Brooklyn Center has worked hard to repair its image and lure in new business.
“Absolutely,” Tape said. “I don’t think it reflects well on Brooklyn Center, which is sad. A lot of good people live here.”
Brooklyn Center is not the only city losing a store. Target is shutting down five others across the U.S. and has already closed 13 earlier this year.
Target will offer Brooklyn Center employees a severance package or the chance to work at another location.
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