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When does cut-rate translate into cutthroat? When is a community carved up by the cutting edge of change?
Or, to put the question more directly, is the new Kmart bound for destiny as the Store That Ate Fresh Meadows, the retail specter that, only hours before Halloween, descended upon the small merchants of 188th Street and swallowed them whole in one rude gulp?
Silence the organ music, rattle not the chains of fear. And don't barricade the door during this 11th hour before the trick-or-treat holiday before considering the full contents of this bountiful basket of goodies being proffered.
Kmart, after all, is not masquerading in the chic, high-glitter costume of a Bloomingdale's but is making its rounds in a simple brown paper bag, an emblem of the no-frills, competitively priced retail approach that has earned it the tiara of the nation's second-largest retailer.
To Kmart's district manager, Thomas Shea, the store's grand opening on Thursday in the former Bloomingdale's building illustrates that to be responsive in the 1990s...