At the bustling Empire Center mall in Burbank there’s a large shell of a building that was occupied by Great Indoors, a high-priced home décor store that closed in August.

Call it one more victim of the recession, but for Wal-Mart Stores Inc. it represents nothing less than an easy opportunity to open a store in the tricky-to-penetrate L.A.-area market.

The Bentonville, Ark., retailer bought the 109,000-square-foot building in June – as well as a second one like it in Irvine – and plans to open stores in those locations soon.

And there may be little Wal-Mart’s opponents can do to stop it.

The company typically builds big stores from the ground up – requiring discretionary approvals from local legislative bodies, often amid stiff opposition – but the Burbank site already has a big box zoned for retail.

About the only thing Wal-Mart needs are a routine business license and some minor permits for limited remodeling.

“This is a great strategy to get into the markets,” said Matthew Sullivan, a principal and retail specialist at the downtown L.A. office of brokerage Lee & Associates – Investment Services Group. “There are Wickes, Levitz and Mervyns that they can go after. Other opportunities are out there.”

In fact, Wal-Mart is in the middle of converting a shuttered Mervyns in Torrance into store, and the company was close last week to signing a lease to open a 30,000-square-foot grocery store at the site of a closed Circuit City in the Northridge Fashion Center, according to brokers familiar with that deal.

One broker, speaking confidentially, said Wal-Mart is scouting at least 15 potential sites in Southern California and 15 in Northern California. He said Wal-Mart is interested in existing shells, already entitled, and will look at small sizes – not just Wal-Mart’s usual mammoth spaces.

Wal-Mart’s simultaneous effort to open stores of much different sizes and concepts reflects a new approach.

That can mean small “neighborhood” grocery stores – the Northridge site would be its first in California, with a few others nationwide – or a willingness to tweak its formula for its regular stores, which typically run 150,000 square feet or more.

“The thing that’s changed for us is we’ve become more flexible in our approach especially in talking about more densely populated communities,” said Wal-Mart spokesman Steven Restivo. “So now we have stores sizes ranging from 15,000 to 150,000 square feet or higher.

“At the end of the day we want the store size and format to be a reflection of the community it’s in and to serve a real need.”

New strategy

To get a sense of why Wal-Mart would employ such new approaches, consider this: The world’s largest retailer operates more than 9,600 stores in 28 countries, including more than 4,400 in the United States. However, the retailer has struggled penetrating big cities, and in Los Angeles County – the most populous in the nation, with 9.8 million residents – it only has roughly 20 stores.

Most are in outlying cities such as Duarte and Palmdale, and only five are in Los Angeles city limits, including stores in Panorama City and Porter Ranch.

It’s not for lack of trying. Almost eight years ago, Wal-Mart lost a high-profile fight to open a store in Inglewood after residents voted down a Wal-Mart-sponsored referendum. In 2004, the Los Angeles City Council passed an ordinance that made it more difficult to build superstores in redevelopment zones. Indeed, most attempts to open a nonunion Wal-Mart in California is met with ferocious opposition from unions, small retailers and others.

However, the housing bust and recession have created an opportunity for Wal-Marts to open in shuttered stores that only need a varying degree of renovation – and little in the way of approvals or permits, which is where Wal-Mart opponents tend to attack. Among the closed retailers that left large shells behind are Circuit City, Linens & Things and Levitz.

It’s not as though Wal-Marts never opened in defunct stores previously. Such stores exist nationwide, while the very first store it opened in Los Angles was in a former Broadway department store in Panorama City.

However, what had been a willingness by Wal-Mart to seize one-off opportunities has evolved into a whole strategy.

“They’ve talked publicly about being in a more urban setting. The ability to find that second-use real estate is a real advantage when they can do that,” said Wal-Mart analyst John R. Lawrence, managing director of equity research at Morgan Keegan & Co. in Memphis, Tenn. “You move quickly without having to go through zoning and construction.”

Wal-Mart pounced when Sears Holdings Corp. decided to shut down its last two Great Indoors stores in California in Burbank and Irvine. The pricey chain opened in 1998 but was hit hard by the housing bust and only a handful of locations remain nationwide.

Store ‘makes sense’

In Burbank, Wal-Mart is moving ahead even though the Empire Center features a Target and Lowe’s, and less than a mile away there is Costco. Other big retailers in Burbank include a K-Mart and Sears. The closest Wal-Mart is roughly 10 miles away in Panorama City. The company has not submitted a formal application to open the Burbank store but has met with city officials and council members.

“We are still having conversations with the city. We think a Wal-Mart store makes sense there and can serve a real need,” said Wal-Mart spokesman Restivo.

Burbank Deputy City Manager Joy Forbes said Wal-Mart is proposing to open a store no larger than the closed Great Indoors and would only need some minor building permits for interior improvements.

“It appears what they want to do is not too different from what Great Indoors did and therefore is permitted under the development agreement. We can’t take back development rights already granted 10 years ago,” Forbes said.

Still, Wal-Mart could face stubborn opponents who don’t agree with that interpretation. Kate Nixa, a Burbank resident and L.A. school teacher, is helping lead a group called No Wal-Mart in Burbank, which has a Facebook page with 638 fans.

“They paint this picture that the community is going to be better with them,” Nixa said. “The impact on a community, when a Wal-Mart comes in, is not positive.”

The group is gathering members and is working with Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, a pro-union downtown L.A. group that assisted the opposition in Inglewood. Nixa said the group is considering its options and looks forward to talking to Wal-Mart officials, who said they plan to schedule community forums.

However, the group’s options may be limited given the outcome of a proposed store in Torrance, where Wal-Mart last year secured a lease at the site of a former Mervyns in a shopping center on Hawthorne Boulevard.

The South Bay city determined that the parcel’s zoning was acceptable for Wal-Mart and issued building permits for the renovations. However, a group of labor-backed residents formed a group called Building an Economically Sound Torrance and sued, contending the renovations required discretionary City Council approval.

The lawsuit also alleged Wal-Mart was fundamentally different from Mervyns and that the new store would generate greater traffic that should have prompted an environmental review. However, a judge found in favor of Wal-Mart and the company plans to begin renovations by the end of the year.

That doesn’t bode well for the Burbank opposition given that the Great Indoors was a big-box concept with high ceilings, and the structure will likely need far less interior work to get ready.

Why Burbank?

Meanwhile, the Burbank Chamber of Commerce has withheld taking a position after officials talked with Wal-Mart representatives, said chamber President Gary Olson

“When I met with them, I said, ‘Why Burbank?’ They are very savvy people and are aware of the success we enjoy here with our Empire Center,” said Olson, who noted the center’s Lowe’s home improvement store, Outback Steakhouse restaurant and Wendy’s fast-food outlet are top performers in California and nationwide.

Olson said membership feelings are mixed, with some welcoming the customers a Wal-Mart will draw from other cities while smaller stores worry they won’t be able to compete.

Other cities in the county may go through the same debate in the future.

Restivo said the company would like to continue its expansion in the L.A. area.

“We think our stores can be part of the solution when it comes to unemployment and access to affordable groceries,” he said.

Richard Lichtenstein, a former Wal-Mart consultant and president of L.A. public relations agency Marathon Communications Inc., said if Wal-Mart is successful in Burbank, expect the company similarly to try to open stores in other communities.

“Depending on their success or failure there, they will evaluate whether what was an opportunity becomes a strategy,” Lichtenstein said. “Each community is different and they have their own set of unique political issues. So it’s hard to say what works in Burbank will work, say, in Oxnard.”