Across the Twin Cities and around Minnesota, Walmart is moving in big.

Last month, a Walmart SuperCenter opened in Brooklyn Center, becoming the 53rd in the state. But it wasn’t its newest Walmart for long.

Last week, another Walmart SuperCenter opened in Lakeville. This coming week, a trio of Walmart SuperCenters will open in Burnsville, in St. Cloud and in Redwood Falls.

For the first time, Minnesota will have more Walmart outlets (including Sam’s Clubs) than it does Target stores.

And more Walmarts are on the horizon. Preliminary work has begun on Walmart SuperCenters in Roseville, in Cottage Grove and in Blaine, while discussions continue about SuperCenters in Plymouth, Chanhassen, Andover and elsewhere.

The scale of Walmart’s expansion in Minnesota should answer any lingering questions about its intentions in the hometown of two major rivals, Target and Supervalu. To analysts, the strategy is crystal clear: Walmart is gunning to become top dog in this market, as it is almost everywhere else.

“Their whole strategy has always been to go into a market and dominate it,” said Stan Pohmer, a Twin Cities retail analyst. “They had made some initial forays into the Twin Cities marketplace, they built up around it, and now they’re going back to their original roots, which is to saturate a marketplace.”

NEW WORLD ORDER

Already, the old order has changed. Until 2005, Cub Foods, Rainbow Foods and Lunds/Byerly’s ranked as the Twin Cities’ top three grocers.

Now, the Big Three grocers are Cub, Target and Walmart. And as one analyst notes, Walmart — the world’s largest retailer — doesn’t like to be in third place anywhere.

“They aren’t in a leadership position (in the Twin Cities), and Walmart wants to be in a leadership position in every market they’re in,” said John Dean, a Twin Cities supermarket analyst.

Cub Foods, owned by Eden Prairie-based Supervalu, and Minneapolis-based Target long have held strong market positions in the Twin Cities, which is widely thought to be one reason Walmart avoided a frontal assault here for years. (Another reason: labor unions.) Instead, Walmart slowly and quietly built up a presence, first in the outstate areas of Minnesota, then in the exurbs of the Twin Cities, and then closer in.

But now that the battle has been joined on Target’s and Cub’s home turf, analysts foresee some fallout.

“What you generally see is, the weaker players will back out,” Pohmer said. “In situations like this, you generally see some of the independent grocery stores … they might sell out. It will foster consolidation.”

Bernie Hesse, a union organizer with the United Food and Commercial Workers, sees the growth of an nonunion retailer like Walmart as having an effect, beyond pressuring wages and benefits for workers.

“It’s going to impact our grocers, we know that, but it’s also going to impact a lot of other big box folks, whether it’s Staples, whether it’s Best Buy, anybody within a 15 minute distance,” Hesse said. “There’s a finite pie in retail right now, and they’re going to be getting a bigger slice.”

The UFCW has resisted the Walmart invasion, most recently in Cottage Grove.

“They keep talking about jobs, and we hope to have a good discussion in that community about job quality,” Hesse said.

RESISTANCE IS FUTILE?

Some citizens are pushing back. When Roseville debated approval of a new Walmart SuperCenter, one resident felt it was disloyal to Cub, Rainbow and Target.

“These stores have been members of our community for several decades, and they have served our community very well!” Roseville resident Gerry McDonald wrote to the city council. “Why are we going to bring in a business that is going to economically challenge and threaten the well being of companies that historically have been exceptional partners to our fair city?”

Yet Walmart often wins these debates because it promises what communities crave: new jobs, new construction, new tax revenues. Plus, it argues the competition is great for consumers. Some analysts agree.

“You do see more aggressive pricing,” Pohmer said. “Bottom line, I think the consumer wins. You’ve got more stores, all of them playing closer to their A game, and the consumer has more choices and gets a better deal.”

Delia Garcia, a spokeswoman for Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart Stores Inc., notes that all five of the Walmarts opening this fall in Minnesota are SuperCenters, which include full grocery lines, including an expansion of its existing Redwood Falls store.

“So when you look at those five stores, you’re creating approximately 1,100 new jobs in Minnesota this year,” Garcia said.

What prompted Walmart to go pedal-to-the-metal in the Twin Cities? Garcia didn’t say specifically but did give a broader response:

“We have an opportunity to serve our customers better, to expand access to fresh, affordable merchandise and be part of economic development plans that communities have, as they look to increase the tax base, create jobs and spur business attraction.”

SUPER, THEN POSSIBLY SMALL

Some Twin Cities communities have cheered Walmart’s arrival.

When the aging Brookdale Center shopping mall was torn down, many in the community were pleased to woo and win a Walmart SuperCenter in its place, which restored some vitality to a troubled retailing area.

But residents of Chanhassen and Plymouth battled plans for Walmart SuperCenters, objecting to noise, traffic and crowds. Those projects have stalled, though analysts think they may return in some fashion.

Virtually all of Walmart’s expansion in Minnesota has been through the SuperCenter, those 150,000 to 200,000-square-foot behemoths that sell both groceries and regular goods.

But nationally, Walmart is expanding in more varied ways. The company recently announced plans to build about 100 Neighborhood Markets, which are roughly one-third the size of a SuperCenter.

“It’s a combination supermarket and pharmacy,” said Dean, the Twin Cities grocery analyst. “They have a little nonfood, but not a great deal. What they’re intended to be is for between bigger trips to your supercenter.”

For now, there are no Neighborhood Markets in Minnesota, and as long as there are spots for new SuperCenters, the focus will remain on gigantic stores. But eventually, Neighborhood Markets are likely to come here, too.

“I don’t have any doubt about that,” Dean said. “Where they’ve built the stores they’ve built, they’re better suited for a SuperCenter. But as they go deeper into the cities, they’ll run into land issues, and they’ll build Neighborhood Markets.”

Walmart is ramping up its Twin Cities presence in other ways. The retailer chose the Twin Cities as one of its five U.S. test markets for same-day delivery of holiday online orders. For a $10 delivery charge, items will be delivered from stores — so the surging number of Walmart stores here makes that task easier.

TARGETING HOMETOWN TARGET

Despite it all, the Twin Cities region has long been Target territory. This is Target’s hometown and remains its strongest market. The discounter opened one store this year in the metro Twin Cities, a SuperTarget in Inver Grove Heights. That means Minnesota now has 26 SuperTargets and 49 regular Target stores, most of which now also carry groceries.

“Overall, Target continues to be selective when choosing new store locations to ensure we make the best use of our resources long term,” Target spokeswoman Erika Winkels said in a statement. “We are committed to the communities in which we do business, and with the recent opening of the Inver Grove Heights store, we are proud to expand our presence in our hometown market of Minneapolis/St. Paul. Target continues to actively pursue opportunities in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area to ensure we can best serve our guests.”

Analysts expect Target to fight to keep a market-leading position.

“Target has worked hard to build that loyalty, the loyalty and trust,” Pohmer said. “Even in today’s marketplace with a changed consumer, loyalty counts a lot. If one believes Target is not going to react in some way, shape or form to the Walmart growth, I think someone is sadly mistaken.”

Tom Webb can be reached at 651-228-5428. Follow him at twitter.com/TomWebbMN.