
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, October 21, 1993                   TAG: 9310210107
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: GREENFIELD, MASS.                                LENGTH: Short

LITTLE TOWN GIVES WAL-MART BLACK EYE

The downtown Wilson's department store bustled Wednesday with the usual old-timers and homemakers hunting for bargains in a town now jokingly dubbed a "Wal-Mart-free zone."

In a public referendum the day before, this western Massachusetts community of 18,000 narrowly rejected a proposed Wal-Mart as too big and threatening to its small-town way of life.

"It's a very unique town, and I don't think we need big businesses like that to come in and take away from the beauty of the town," said Tami Silk, a customer at Wilson's.

It was the latest setback to the nation's largest retailer in its push to transplant its style of Gargantuan storefronts and Lilliputian pricing to New England. Company spokesman Jane Arend said she was unaware of any other community in the country that has voted down a Wal-Mart.

Downtown merchants, young professionals who fled big cities, ex-hippies, social activists and diehard Yankees joined hands in an unlikely alliance that led the campaign against rezoning land two miles outside downtown for the Wal-Mart.

The rezoning measure lost by only nine votes, 2,854 to 2,845, but town officials said they did not expect a recount.

At company headquarters in Bentonville, Ark., Arend said Wal-Mart would drop its Greenfield proposal but might try to place a store nearby.

by CNB