Target applies for liquor license for downtown Nicollet Mall store

Target wants to sell alcohol at the Nicollet Mall store next to its downtown Minneapolis headquarters.

The retailer has applied for a license from the city for a liquor store that would have a separate entrance on the first floor at 9th and Nicollet. The Target store it would be attached to is slated to get a $10 million makeover later this year.

Target started selling alcohol in its stores in 1996 and now offers beer, wine and liquor in more than 1,350 of its 1,800 stores nationwide. It first started doing so in Minnesota in 2014 with a liquor store in Otsego. It now sells alcohol in seven Target Wine & Spirits shops in Minnesota that are connected to its stores but also have separate entrances in order to keep in line with state laws.

"While relatively new to Minnesota, Target's alcohol business is established and growing," Kristy Welker, a Target spokeswoman, said in an email.

Craft beer, in particular, has been a recent home run for Target across its chain. Executives told investors last month that the category is one of the fastest-growing parts of Target's grocery business.

And, of course, alcohol sales have been a particularly hot topic in Minnesota of late with the state recently passing a bill, slated to take effect in July, that lifts a longtime statewide ban of liquor sales on Sundays.