http://finance.yahoo.com/family-home/article/106466/Where-You-Wont-Shop-in-2009 Expect closings and bankruptcies to rattle the likes of Lane Bryant, Gap, and Starbucks. It's the inevitable counterpunch to the days of retailers fighting hand over fist for market share during an era of loose credit and minuscule interest rates. Retailers at risk in 2009, he thinks, include outerwear specialist Eddie Bauer and teen-apparel-seller Pacific Sunwear, along with Zales, the big jewelry chain. All three shuttered at least 8% of their U.S. stores last year, with many more closings expected. The same is largely true of Charming Shoppes, the owner of Lane Bryant, which closed 150 stores last year. With a mountain of debt and losses totaling over $260 million over the most recent 12-month reporting period, the company will close another 100 locations this year. Another possible casualty: Sears Holdings, operator of Sears and Kmart stores. A key to hedge fund manager Eddie Lampert's 2005 merger of the two chains was in the underlying real estate. But with those values down 30% or so since then, slumping sales hit even worse.
Gap is the advertisement I get on this page Its not surprising that there will be a fallout in retail chains especially if they are highly leveraged . Supermarkets will probably do better.People have to eat I will mss Starbucks the most .There is free wi-fi access close to my home.
This is true about eating, however a lot of people here are going to the super Wal marts for there food, because the Super markets here, the big names are all union, and there prices are a lot higher. So what I see in the future if times stay tough is that Super Wal Marts will pop up all over, and the Unions in the supermarkets will either have to give concessions, or maybe de-certify to stay competive price wise.
I refuse to shop at Super Wal Mart, I'd rather pay a local (regional) store more money than shop at that hellhole. In Florida shopping at Walmart is a hideous experience.
Its a valid point but I think a lot of shoppers like convenience .They tend to buy their food close to home .There are a dozen Publix to one Walmart at least in Florida . That may change if money gets tighter though
Here is just an example. We have right down the street a Wal Mart being changed to a super Wal Mart next to a Vons super market like a Publix in Florida. A gallon of milk is 2.63 at Wal Mart, and at Vons is right at 4.00 or more. The distance is like a 1/4 a mile. Things have gotten extremely tight here.
Bro I hear you. I don't either, but being down to one income there are things that are cheaper that help us stretch our budget further.
I think there's this company called Folgers that makes relatively inexpensive coffee somewhere that was thrown under the bus by starbucks. I think.
Correction, where are millions of college students going to go to get over-caffeinated without having to do all the work of actually making the coffee? Though I guess they could close one of the 3 shops within walking distance here at UCLA.
i hope more people shop in the supermarkets. i make commission on certain products at publix(in fl) and the more you people buy, the better! make me rich!
I work in a Supermarket and just to give you the run down real quick. People are shopping more, but are opting for the cheaper brand items (ie- Publix Black Beans over Bush's) and are cashing in on sales. I don't expect Supermarket stocks to go up that much because more profit is made off of more expensive items. That being said, they should stay relatively healthy in this very unhealthy economy.
tell me about it. I work for Tree of Life and specialize in high end stuff. were going to have to look into pushing more cheaper products if we want to max our profits
Starbucks isn't going anywhere. Store closings, reorg of their debt maybe, but not disappearing. They could disappear for all I care though. As a semi-coffee geek I can't stand their coffee. They get the nickname Charbucks for a reason
Starbucks is not closing. They will continue to reorganize, as they did today. They over saturated the market and are closing "under performing" stores. They made a $64 million dollar profit last year. I don't see how a retailer can go bankrupt while making profits. My girlfriend is a Starbucks store manager and they are actually doing very well but she manages one of the 10 busiest stores in Canada. This is more media related panic. Sure, they are closing stores but only the ones that are doing badly. That is a good way to do business. They are opening stores at the same time, at least in Canada. MY g/f has two new ones opening in her district in the next 3 months and they still can't find enough people to employ. That said, she BETTER not get laid off seeing as I did last week.
Well they are closing stores if you want to get technical about it, but I know that. Just trying to humor. Don't have to take it that seriously.
Same here. You could see that place crumbling from the insde years ago. They brought it on themselves with poor customer service and poor store mgt. IMO.
I can totally dig that, everything helps. It's just in my mind, for what it's worth, every dollar we spend at Wal Mart cut's the American worker a little deeper. All that money going overseas everyday has got to be one of the major reasons our economy is in the crapper. I'm no expert on this type of stuff, so I'm shooting from the hip, but I feel that if we kept our money here, our economy would begin to recover. I'd rather do without something for a little while (if possible) and buy it from the little guy than send my money to China. I realize that it often gets there anyway, so I'm probably cutting off my nose to spite my face, but **** it. It feels good to know that I helped out my fellow man when I shop, instead of helping some sweatshop in Asia continue to abuse their workers and pay them crap.
I tried explaining these sentiments to my girlfriend, it was a lost cause. Until the Govt. steps in and admits the loophole in the Free Market, our economy will continue to sputter.
I actually chuckled a little to see the prediction that Starbucks dissapears. Just as you guys said. THey will rerorganize. They simply oversaturated the concept into "B" and "C" secondary locations. Which were all pretty much doing well at the time but with the downturn they need to pull back. Their "A" or prime locations are still doing just fine. It's not just about coffee. They've created an entire culture with their stores that is now woven into the work ethic of students and professionals around the entire country. People are willing to pay more for the experience still and the ability to come into a hip study/reading area complete with internet access and all kinds of caffeine bevs. just a step away. They are too entrenched into society at this point to dissapear.
You get a gold star in my book! All the people that carry the Free Market flag in debates irritate the crap out of me. The reason is simple. You cannot compete in a free market where other countries are simply not willing to play by the same rules. That is why the Free market theory is totally flawed. It is killing our economy. It's simply a tool to maximize stockholder profits in the short term at the expense of those companies and our economy in the long run.
