Edhat Staff
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By edhat staff
The new “small format” Target store in the Santa Barbara Galleria scheduled their grand opening on Sunday, April 7.
Edhat attended a private ribbon cutting and store preview on Tuesday evening with Target’s employees, Santa Barbara Mayor Cathy Murillo, city council members, and guests.
During the ribbon cutting ceremony Target employees presented donations to two local nonprofits. The United Way and Santa Barbara Zoo each received a $3,000 donation.
The former Galleria location at 3891 State Street has been remodeled into a sleek 34,000 square-foot two-story store and is the first Target location in south Santa Barbara County.
Target has employed 80 team members and offers a small-store format with a product selection the company states is tailored for local residents and nearby working professionals. It has a little bit of everything: groceries, clothing, stationery and party supplies, toys, alcohol, beauty care, electronics, and home decor. This location also includes “Order Pickup,” where shoppers can order online and pick up in store within an hour.
Nationwide, Target is opening small-format stores in urban areas, dense suburban neighborhoods and near college campuses where a full-size Target store may not fit. With the addition of the Santa Barbara store, Target now operates 94 small-format stores, with a total of 1,851 Target stores nationwide. Target plans to open approximately 30 small-format stores a year over the next few years.
The Grand Opening will take place on Sunday, April 7 at 8:00 a.m. and will feature an in-store celebration. Complimentary reusable bags will be distributed to the first 1,000 guests.
Target also plans to open a larger store in Goleta at 6865 Hollister Ave, the former location of KMart, later this year.
The city of SB has lost sales tax revenue with the exit of major stores (Macy’s/Sears, to name a couple of big ones). The sales tax revenue of this store will be fairly significant. I support the mayor and her ability to bring Target to our community. The majority of our residents have been wanting this for years.
The city brags they are now rolling in dough after voters passed Measure C, which increased the local retail sales tax last year, which was declining due to major loss of retail sales downtown. However, Measure C revenues really helped mask the ever increasing city employee pension costs, so Measure C really was not new money; just a temporary band-aid. Most of the Measure C money has gone to park improvements which today only get used by vagrants, while the roads that residents actually use are in desperate condition. Where will the money come from to even start fixing our city streets? Measure C won’t pay for them. Next will have to be a Measure D – more taxes on top of this last tax. While city revenues get squandered on the city’s unsustainable defined-benefit city employee pension plan that has no upper limits. Voters, please put reforming this city Ponzi pension scheme at the top of your voter priorities, when we vote for new city council members this fall. Pension reform now. The rest will fall into place once we tame the city employee pension beast.
“her ability to bring Target to our community”… plans for this were rolling well before she became mayor and wasn’t the result of any politicking, just good old fashion capitalism.
Factorum is right. Its pretty sad that people do not pay mind and worse, push away the fiscal facts. Obviously there are city employees and their families downvoting these posts. No sane person would see the figures and think “gee, these are great!”. Sorry to break it to you insiders, but your salad days are over. The reckoning will come either by force or fate. The 30+ years of public employee unions stealing billions from future generations to pad their own accounts is about to come to a crashing halt. You can have the pleasure of explaining to your grandkids why they are indebted up to their eyeballs and taxed out of a decent future while you coasted into a cushy retirement. They will spend the rest of their lives struggling to pay for your misgivings and greed and while barely knocking out a simple middle class existence.
It warms the cockles of my heart to know that many on Edhat are thrilled by this latest edition to the holy mess of traffic up on “Upper” State St. By my experience (a friend took me to the Target in Camarillo), Target sells, for the most part, ricky-ticky-tacky junk made in China. Target food department was completely lacking in healthy food choices. Have fun, shoppers, supporting planned obsolescence items (non-durable/non-replaceable parts) and cheaply made clothing and bedding items.
So this is what our Mayor does with her time? She applauds min-wage, part-time jobs, corporate profits on our time and on our dime. I wonder how Target is going to handle our plastic bag ban? Do they even have paper bags? I hope so. And yes, the parking will be a nightmare because in SB every spot is sized for a Prius or smaller while every other car on the road is actually a mid to plus size SUV.
Just park near Panera Bread or Macy’s and walk over.
Definitely a major win for everyone to have Target at that location. Even though our household has three cars, we plan to take MTD to do basic shopping. Nice to know they have fresh organic fruits and veggies. Cannot wait to go through all the aisles to find things to buy and everything!
Edhat .. it is already open ! Grand opening Sunday but you can shop now. I was there this morning. Parking is really fine. And it is small, small, small ! Normal shopping at Target can get a lengthy experience. Not this store. I call it the 7-11 of Targets. I was in and out in less than 15 minutes. Probably won’t go back. Will wait for normal format Target coming to Goleta. This one is too tiny.
Retail sales, low skill entry level jobs are perfect to develop your own necessary work habits that serve you for the rest of your life either as an employee or as your own boss business owner: customer satisfaction is key, make a profit and be valuable to your employer, be dependable, show up on time, don’t bring in outside problems or attitudes, observe tasks that need to be done without being asked.
Taking MTD adds $4 to your final bill shopping at Target – be sure you spend enough to make the additional MTD cost worth it.
Pass. Target is a dud. Selection is non-existent. Parking is a mess. Congestion is terrible. Not worth the time or effort.
Will Target be here for the long haul? Or will this business venture prove to be another casualty in the SB retail market in a few years? Opinions?
someone pee in your cheerios this morning? sheesh! we are in santa barbara. we have small streets and too many cars. that won’t change.
so many whiners and grumpy people! it’s a store. a store the majority have wanted for over a decade. stop crying
I feel bad for those poor people who live in The Marc. They certainly pay a lot to live there, and now they have this Target opening up next door. I bet this isn’t what they signed up for.
Zerohawk: What’s with the comments on “whining”? Not worth your time or energy. As Pop taught me, “A man convinced against his will is of the same opinon still.” (And before someone jumps on me for being “sexist”, it’s an old saying and applies to everyone regardless of their gender.)
ZEROHAWK: Crass.
ZEROHAWK: Crass. (And I meant to send it multiple times.)
At 12:31 – and hopefully, you get deleted multiple times.