I'm so tired of hearing about small shops that are being run out of business because of the big box stores or the chains. Customers are free to go wherever they want to go, and if they *decide* to shop at the big stores, that's their choice; big stores don't come into town and drive the store owners out with guns to their heads. If the little store has what the customers want, they'll survive; if not, customers will shop elsewhere, even if that means road trips to Sam's or Costco or buying online.
There was a local restaurant here that went out of business and their quotes in the newspaper had to do with how the new chain restaurants drove them out of business. We didn't avoid that place because there were chains in town, we didn't go there because the food was lousy and the service wasn't much better. There are other small restaurants that are thriving.
Don't get me wrong -- I'm all for the mom 'n pop shops. Heck, I AM a mom 'n pop shop (not food related). But no matter how cute or quaint or whatever you may be, if you can't drag customers in, you aren't going to stay in business. Part of that is knowing what the customers want and what they'll pay enough for so you can stay in business.
I used to have a retail shop, and I got really tired of customers coming in to tell me about the big sales elsewhere. When they needed advice or service, they came to me first, but when they bought things, they went online or they shopped for sales, and I couldn't blame them for wanting to save money. Heck, if I could get something at retail that was cheaper than what my distributors had, I'd shop there too.
So I wised up, realized I was never going to be able to compete on price for retail goods, dumped the retail, and now I'm doing service only. And making more money than I ever did (with less hbuttle) than when I was carrying all that inventory. Two years later, I still get calls from people who crawl out of the woodwork looking for my "store," and they tell me that they loved my little store and it's too bad it's gone. But if they hadn't noticed I was out of retail for 2 years, they certainly weren't keeping me in business.
