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"Why it's the Model T Ford made the trouble, made the people want to go, wanna git, wanna git up and go seven, eight, nine, ten, twelve, fourteen, twenty-two, twenty-three miles to the county seat. Who's gonna patronize a little bitty two by four kinda store anymore?"
And the stores in the small towns started to die off. Now it's a click on the internet and it gets delivered to your door -- cheaper.
A lot of brick and mortar retail is going away. And with it the construction and maintenance of all those brick and mortar buildings. Much as small town america is filled with closed stores, the cities and suburbs will be as well.
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When manufacturing jobs first started to move to India, China and Korea, laid off workers took positions in department stores in Pittsburgh. They were very aware of the value of a job, even a much lower paying one. They were polite, helpful and knowledgeable. It was a pleasure to shop, buying a suit, being measured, informed about the manufacturer, the fabric, etc. I once picked up a suit in Kauffmans and since I was in a hurry and trusted them, wasn't going to try it on to see if the alterations were done correctly. The salesman was so concerned and disappointed that he couldn't complete his responsibility to his customer, I felt that I had to just slow down and humor him.
Now I am a point and click shopper. I even buy cars on the internet and just pick them up at a local dealer. Internet sales is so efficient but they have not scratched the surface yet of all the benefits to manufacturers. I once developed a retail product line that was a byproduct of an industrial process. The markup at the retail level was 40% and at the distributor level 25%. As the manufacturer I had to sell profitably at a price that was 57% of the final sales price. To be reasonably profitable the margins in the chain were mandatory due to distribution costs. If an internet existed, I could have sold the product much cheaper and efficiently, reduced handling, less breakage, direct shipments, no salesmen and less inventory in the supply chain.
Brick and mortar is sunk costs that can only be compensated for by outstanding service but where will you get that anymore?
keys copied at ace hardware, getting work done
on your car or house or yourself -- but most of the
routine purchasing stuff is going online, it seems.
our faltering economy isn't helping a bit. . imho. -- j
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