Walmart Canada plans 29 new stores in $340M expansion

Walmartsays it plans to add 29 new supercentre stores in Canada over the next 12 months.

The expansion plan announced Wednesday is expected to cost $340million and create 3,700 construction jobs, 1,000 in-store jobs and 300 new positions at distribution centres.

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The move comes after11 new Walmart supercentresopened across Canada in January, andon the heels of Walmart rival Target's ignominious retreat in the coming weeks from the Canadian market, less than two years after opening to much fanfare.

Although an impressive figure, the $340 million is actually less than the retailer said it pledged to spend in 2014 this time last year, whenit said it was planning on spending $500 million and open 35 new stores.

The total price tag willinclude the remodelling and expansion of several stores to add full grocery departments.

The $340 million totalincludes the following spending plans:

• Roughly $230 million on new stores.
• $75 millionto add distribution centres.
• $35 million to beef up the chain's online offerings.

Walmart Canada's store count will rise to 396 by the end of January2016, of which309 will besupercentres and 87 will be discount stores.

Walmart says the locations of specific store and distribution centre projects will be announced over the coming weeks and months as projects become finalized.