12-02-2015, 12:38 PM
Lowes had already planned to come to Hilo and then they pulled out. Their decision put the kabash on building a new shopping center near the airport that included some other chain stores including a Petco. Lowes was going to be the anchor store. They probably used their sales data from their Kona ghost-town store (it's always empty) in making their decision. Crazy they opened up in Kona when the fastest growing part of the state is on the other side of the island. Not a good business acumen to locate a home building store a hundred miles from 55,000 undeveloped vacant lots, especially considering all the DIY permitted and unpermitted builders.