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With almost everything available through Internet stores I would not lack for anything so long as UPS knew where I lived. Retail has always been a tough business and has become even tougher.
And part of the reason it has become tougher is because people buy so much on the internet and at the big box stores.
I waited on someone yesterday who came in for a pound of nails. He made a comment about the low quantity of inventory at the store. I replied that when people are not buying, you can't keep the inventory on hand, but that everything is still available with just a few days notice if not in stock. His reply was "What if you are doing something and don't know in advance that you are going to need something?" After a little discussion, it came out that he meant, "What if you drive the 20 miles one way to the big box store to get all the materials for a project and then discover as you are working on the project, that you didn't get enough material and need one or two pieces to finish up?" The local merchant can't stay open if people only use them for the "fill in"items.
By the way, I checked the price on the 1 pound of nails he was after. $2.15 at our place, $2.47 at the big box store. (plus gas). Heck, I would have sold him a half pound of nails if that was all he wanted. Would have been $1.08.
Try to buy just a half pound of nails at a big box store.
I live in a nice college town of 5200 in Western Minnesota. Life here is easy. Our community has an educated populace, an excellent hospital, some agribusiness, and a university. What we lack, however, is competitive shopping.
While many here on the forum decry the evils of big box retailing, our community overpays for groceries and clothing. Granted, the libertarian in me thinks that if I'm stupid to pay $4.75 a gallon for skim milk, so be it. In general, if the local grocery store wants to gouge me, I have no choice other than to travel an hour to the nearest community with more competition and retailing. My complaint is that our local retailers put pressure on the city leadership to keep competition out. That, I feel is wrong.
Having a protectorate economy doesn't seem to improve our downtown district. We've lost many of the mom and pop stores. Most everyone travels out of the county to the nearest shopping hub to "stock up."
We live without a Wal-Mart or large grocery store; are we any better off?
At what point are indepedent merchants taking advantage of their customers? Is it fair that merchants have enough clout to keep big box retailers out? By having Wal-Mart in your community, you don't even have to trade there to receive the effects of competition.
Every time you shop at Slavemart you are undermining the US economy, be happy to live where you don't have to
One benefit is that when I support my small local retailer, he (or she) supports MY community. With jobs for people I know, with donations for various civic organizations and the local sports teams, as well as funding some of the activities at our local school. And in the case of my local grocer... he offers in-store charge accounts that I know have helped people feed their families during lean times until they could square up their bill, and in a few cases.. just GAVE needy families some food that they needed. Show me a WalMart that does all that.
My closest town does not have Big Box Stores and refuses too. They claim it will keep people from supporting local businesses, but I am afraid that it is not true. When I talked with the local car dealer, he said the best day of the week for most car dealerships is on Saturday, but in that town it is actually on Monday. The reason is simple...people simply leave town on the weekends to go to the bigger towns that do have Big Box Stores.
I don't like it either, BUT when the cost of living since the 1970's has gone up by 34% and the average income has only gone up 15%, a family and individual has to stretch their dollar. I dislike Walmart, Tractor Supply and Home Depot as much as the next guy, but they do have cheaper prices on most things. Most of the time the extra mileage to get there is absorbed by the cost savings.
Local dollars spent locally stay 80% local (from wages to schools, profits / benefits are re-plowed into community, suppliers, truckers, print shop, newspaper, bank... ALL benefit from local businesses.
Have you ever found that the Big Box stores ONLY stock high profit / high turnover products? (try to get a part for your 30 yr old wash machine... or ANY wash machine for that matter) Do NOT try to get a part for your 50 yr old tractor at big box... (or ask their tire dept to fix your flat tractor tire). You educate a higher level of responsibility / customer service into your kids that are working these local jobs. (How many HS kids do you see working at Big BOX?)
As a community, you can work together. Once you get to catering to the masses (as BigBox does), you lose community connections (and responsibility). It is MUCH easier to point fingers and avoid issues, this is VERY bad for community health.
Consider the downside... BIG box DOLLARS SPENT flee the community (suppliers, profits, benefits)
Wages will be less, (likely, but certainly Quality of life for worker is less... getting off work to attend local funeral / ballgame...)
Town / businesses will suffer (from property owners to business owners to employees to city services).
Community becomes 'them vs. US'. (Not good)
You need bigger roads, more stoplights, more city services, bigger (Staffed) fire dept. ... BigBox hosting is not free...
Big Box is suffering BIG TIME. cycle is about exhausted, A HEALTHY community will thrive in the future, one destroyed by an alien BigBox will languish.
StealthRabbit...I disagree. Lowes and Home Depot are taking a hit right now because of the housing market, particularly the new housing starts aspect of things which are way down, but that is just because of a depressed economy, not because the local market is flourishing. And a lot of the Lowes stores closings can be blamed on an ambitious company trying to grab too much market share. It was also based on personal reasons where as they were trying to stick a Lowes in wherever a Home Depot sprouted up, whether or not the market in that area could support it. You got a divorce, get over it I say, and that is an emotional decision and not sound business practice.
But stating that our kids would have jobs in a local economy is silly, and blaming big box stores for a lack of youth is as well. The only thing they can really be cited for is having a drug testing policy which precludes a lot of younger people perhaps. The bigger problem is that the younger generation just does not want to work. Here in Maine we used to hire kids to rake blueberries and put up hay for the farms, but the blueberry companies have had to resort to migrant workers, and on the farm we turned to hay alternatives because you cannot get kids to work today. And we as parents are to blame for that, we raised spoiled kids and we have the work ethic now to show for it. Don't even try to somehow pin the blame of that on a Big Box Store...we created that monster via poor parenting.
In the future I see what my community has pretty much embraced...big box stores selling items, and smaller companies doing the servicing of what they sell.
In the future I see what my community has pretty much embraced...big box stores selling items, and smaller companies doing the servicing of what they sell.
And therein lies the problem. Selling the item has a greater profit margin than servicing the item. Why do you think the big box stores don't have service departments?
The local building supply center where I work has had to cut back drastically on inventory as the consumers began driving the 20 miles one way believing the little they saved on the actual item made the trip worthwhile. Then they would come in wanting to match something they ran short of as they didn't want to make that trip for one or two more items as that would have run the total cost above what it would have been if they had purchased it locally.
We used to sell a particular brand of storm door as our main brand. The nearest BigBox sold the same brand, but a lower quality line. People would go get the less expensive (no, it really was cheaper) door and then come to us when they had problems with it, wanting us to correct the situation and cover the warranty. Sorry, we really had difficulty doing that. Even if we could get the repair part at "no cost", there was still the time, phone calls, etc. that we had invested in it, with no gain for us. Our policy had to become, We sell the part, we will honor the warranties and provide the service. You get it somewhere else, we will help you if we can, but you will cover ALL costs, including overhead.
And to some people, we have become the "Scrooges". Thankfully, there are people who understand that, and because of it, I can still go in to work every day. Our former crew of 10 full time employees has dwindled to 2 full and 2 part-time workers.
Local dollars spent locally stay 80% local (from wages to schools, profits / benefits are re-plowed into community, suppliers, truckers, print shop, newspaper, bank... ALL benefit from local businesses.
Each dollar spent locally brings $16 worth of economy to the community. Each dollar spent at a chain brings $.46 in worth to the community.
I used to live more than 2 hours from any chain stores. At one point I only shopped for groceries 4 times a year and didn't find it necessary to shop the large chains.
Now that I do have the option, I don't use them. I like supporting the smaller businesses for economic reasons and because the quality is better. I'm not a big shopper, though.
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(suppliers, profits, benefits)
(likely, but certainly Quality of life for worker is less... getting off work to attend local funeral / ballgame...)
