Target in Bairnsdale will close its doors on October 17 as part of a planned shutdown of stores in East Gippsland.
Kmart, which closed its doors further along Nicholson Street on Sunday, will now occupy the Target store in a reduced version of its original store.
In a statement, Kmart said it was happy to announce that “Kmart Group have made the decision to transform Target Bairnsdale into a new concept K hub”.
Kmart said the move allows it “to remain part of the Bairnsdale community and give customers access to all three of our Kmart Group brands”.
Both Kmart and Target are part of the Kmart Group, which is owned by Wesfarmers. In order to begin the conversion process, the planned closure of Target has been brought forward to October 17.
Works will take place throughout October, so that the new K hub store can open around mid November 2020.
An employee was seen dismantling the window display framework in the Target store on Tuesday.
A sign in the window advises customers of the impending closure encouraging them to instead shop online.
Target customers formed a long queue as they snapped up sale items in the Bairnsdale store on Tuesday afternoon.
Many Bairnsdale residents told the Advertiser that they were disappointed to see Target close.
Casey Skipp said “it’s a pity for the community, but I’ll look to shop online”.
Regular shopper, Judy White, said “I’m going to miss it. I’ll probably end up going to Sale”.
“It’s a shame, it’s a good shop,” Mindy Orsolino said.
Kmart, who last month announced it would be standing down staff who couldn’t be redeployed to other stores, on Tuesday said it had been “blown away” by offers of support from other businesses based in the town.
“We want to say a big thank you to every company and organisation who has reached out and expressed interest in our talented team, especially the local newsagencies and our friends at McDonalds,” a Kmart spokesperson said.
“We are excited at the prospect of having our team redeployed into these businesses and are grateful to be able to also redeploy some of them into our new K hub store.
“As this store will be a smaller format than our previous Kmart store, we won’t have the ability to re-employ all of our Kmart and Target team members across unfortunately, but we are committed to supporting them through this process and to helping them find meaningful employment.”
Kmart had employed about 100 staff at its Bairnsdale store.

IMAGE:
Target customers were seen lining up in the Bairnsdale store on Tuesday as they snapped up bargains following the decision to close the store in just over two weeks. K411-6990