The Westbrook store would complete a ring of Wal-Marts around Portland.

WESTBROOK (AP) – Wal-Mart has announced plans to build a new “Supercenter” at the site now occupied by the 85-year-old Saunders Brothers wood products mill.

The 203,000-square-foot store, which would include a full grocery, is expected to create 450 jobs, nearly three-fourths of them full-time, the discount retailer said.

Saunders Brothers announced in September that it plans to consolidate its manufacturing operations in Locke Mills.

With Wal-Marts in Falmouth and Scarborough, the Westbrook store would complete a ring of Wal-Marts around Portland. It also would mean more competition for the state’s two major supermarket chains, Shaw’s and Hannaford.

The 27-acre Wal-Mart site off the Westbrook Arterial is near a new Hannaford supermarket and not far from a shopping plaza where Shaw’s is planning a new store.

The Wal-Mart, which is projected to open by the summer of 2006, would be the company’s 25th store in Maine, and the tenth Supercenter.

Mia Masten, a spokeswoman for Wal-Mart, said the chain decided to add a store in Westbrook after market research indicated a lot of customers at the Scarborough and Falmouth stores came from the area.

AP-ES-12-24-03 0216EST