Wal-Mart buys Winn-Dixie on North Trail for new store

BUYER: Wal-Mart Stores East LP, Bentonville, Ark.

SELLER: LF Limited LP and Walnut Street Partners LLLP

PROPERTY: 3500 N. Tamiami Trail, Sarasota

PRICE: $2.65 million

PREVIOUS PRICE: $1.18 million, December 1996

LAW FIRM ON DEED: Adams and Reese LLP., Tampa

PLANS, DESCRIPTION: After months of planning work, retail giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc. purchased the 39,961-square-foot former Winn-Dixie grocery store on U.S. 41 for $2.65 million.

The price equated to $66 per square foot.

Wal-Mart Stores plans to demolish the existing store and replace it with a 33,803-square-foot Walmart Neighborhood Market grocery store. Winn-Dixie closed its store there in mid-2010 as a part of a corporate restructuring, leaving a Publix store on 10th Street as the closest North Trail grocery store.

The planned store is expected to create 90 to 100 jobs.

The neighborhood market will be the first of its kind in Sarasota County. There are 27 statewide, including one in Tampa, one in Largo and one in Pinellas Park.

The new store is scheduled to open next year.

— additional reporting by Kurt Schultheis, correspondent