American, however, was not one of the bigger discounters, and in some markets its new fares were actually higher than existing fares.

Ms. Preston recommended that owners try to "fill in the gaps" that big discounters sometimes overlook.

That means that two of the biggest discounters have joined the warehouse trend started by the Price Club.

At least one big discounter saw solid increases.

The objections to a big national discounter in Old Saybrook (population: 10,000) are about the same as those in scores of towns.

Other big discounters, like Wal-Mart and Price Club, have opened urban stores as well.

Kmart recently began selling Drypers, becoming the first big discounter to do so.

In the same way, the company has deployed coupon "catalogues" as a response to the cutthroat pricing of the big discounters.

Mr. Lawhorne said, "We're certainly not going to let Sears say that they are the big discounters."

Wal-Mart and Kmart, two far bigger discounters, have a long way to go to catch up to Target's fashions.