Down Sizing the Big Box Store

[drum118]

Over the last few months, there been a number of articles talking about the big box stores starting to down size them.

Best Buy is down sizing a number of store as well closing some of them in the US.

Kansas City is going to see a number of Walmart stores in the 45,000-60,000 sq ft range and this is also happening to other places also.

This article on "If Walmart Were a City" was found on The Atlantic Cities site and goes hand in hand as what can happen here.

There is talk that Walmart may come an anchor for a new development on the Lakeshore in Mississauga, where a 60,000 sq ft store could fit in nicely.

There been talk by the board about having a Walmart store in the core over the years and that still can happen with a smaller store.

One only has to look at Dundas St to find Best Buy, Future Shop and Canadian Tire on it.

I have being saying far too long that the cities are for people and not the car to the point we need to start building these boxes into developments, as well other thing, so people can live, play, shop and work in the same area.

The current expansion to Yorkdale Mall is an example of miss opportunity where condos, office and other use could be built on top of it to the point it would become a 7/24/365 place and generate a higher return on the investment.

One has to look at the Queen and Portland complex to see it was a good move even though Home Depot back out.

Even Republic of Yonge & Eglinton is another example where school and condos can work in the same location.

Big is not always better, but having nothing in a location and forcing people to get into their cars to shop these days, causes all kinds of problems for everyone.

Time to think outside the box and all that wasted space for these Big Box complex.

 

[SP!RE]

So long as they are in an appropriate area, and are designed and landscaped nicely, I have nothing wrong big box stores in most cases.

The point of a Home Depot is that it's big- you go there with the expectation that they are going to have a full range of hardware and the building supplies you need. In this case, a smaller store is disadvantageous even to the people it is meant to serve, in my opinion.

Of course it's tricky because we don't want to squash smaller stores. But that's where this idea of the "appropriate area" comes from. We live in a capitalist society for better or worse, so competition is going to happen and smaller stores will disappear. But the truly great smaller private bookstores (and maybe even hardware stores) will survive, one hopes, amidst big box competition. However, we can mitigate our losses and prevent smaller stores from being squashed by keeping big box stores out of established old neighbourhoods and keeping them in the suburbs (even inner suburbs which are easily accessed) or at least the outer areas in the city's core.

 

[junctionist]

With a few exceptions like some Loblaws stores, big-box stores don't tend to serve neighbourhoods very well in their current form. They tend to discourage any way of getting to the store without a car by the design of their stores in relation to the street grid and transit facilities, even if a cluster of big box stores is all a neighbourhood has for retail. So they increase traffic congestion and pollution, and make areas less walkable. Their large surface parking lots are ugly, wasteful of land, and environmentally unsound being impermeable to stormwater and contributors to the urban heat island effect. They discourage placemaking in favour of the most generic corporate architecture.

With that placelessness comes a corresponding level of indifference among the public towards cleanliness; big box parking lots tend to be the dirtiest places in terms of litter, which often blows into the neighbourhoods around them. The urban big-box stores we've seen in the past few years represent important steps forward to addressing these issues, but continuing to build the same kinds of suburban stores anywhere in this urban region would be negative. The Stock Yards redevelopment into a generic big-box zone represents one of the greatest missed opportunities for urban redevelopment in the past 20 years in Toronto. We're only beginning to correct the mistakes there.

 

[Dandy Horse]

amen to that junctionist. I was walking through the very crowded Dufferin Mall parking lot the other day, and nearly stepped on a dead rat. once i got out to Bloor street, the sidewalks were empty. Big Box development is the most disgusting buidling arrangement, and completely inappropriate for a city that people live in and care about. Its simply not build with people in mind.

 

[Lenser]

Completely agree.. especially about the size of the parking lots and the associated drainage and heat issues and how wasteful and ugly that kind of land allocation can be in a vibrant city of highly populated neighbourhoods. These things also tend to age poorly and are not designed to fit in with the surrounding neighbourhoods - they tend to be stolid utilitarian boxes that do nothing for the aesthetics of the surrounding area. The suburbs can keep 'em if they're happy with 'em, but for a rapidly densifying core they're simply, as currently manifested anyway, a very bad fit. It's difficult to consider the big box phenomenon without also considering the car and how the two are inseparably linked.

 

[toto]

I would like see the redevelopment on big box store areas, into medium to high density neighbourhoods. The parking lots would become low and highrise mixed use buildings and the poorly built retail (big boxes) would be replaced with commercial/ retail buildings. An area like the one along Eglinton Ave. east of Victoria Park could easily accomodate a development twice or three times the size of City Place.

 

[adma]

amen to that junctionist. I was walking through the very crowded Dufferin Mall parking lot the other day, and nearly stepped on a dead rat. once i got out to Bloor street, the sidewalks were empty. Big Box development is the most disgusting buidling arrangement, and completely inappropriate for a city that people live in and care about. Its simply not build with people in mind.

Though Dufferin Mall's sins have more to do with traditional mall sins than with present-day big-box sins, even if one may carry over into the other in certain regards.

And with that considered, the advent of SmartCentre-type arrays actually makes Dufferin Mall look good (even if "grubbier") by comparison--at least it's relatively compact, not amorphously denucleated, and hemmed-in by traditional urbanity.

Funny thing about malls in general; one can almost always get a germ of that Victor Gruen dream of having "people in mind". Compare Yorkdale to the corresponding big boxes N of the 401, or Eglinton Square with the brownfields-into-big-boxes dystopia to the east: even amidst their seas of parking, the much-derided old-school mall succeeds better in transmitting a certain sense of place and gravitas...

 

[adma]

I would like see the redevelopment on big box store areas, into medium to high density neighbourhoods. The parking lots would become low and highrise mixed use buildings and the poorly built retail (big boxes) would be replaced with commercial/ retail buildings. An area like the one along Eglinton Ave. east of Victoria Park could easily accomodate a development twice or three times the size of City Place.

Don't be surprised if they are, in practice, the hyperscaled "taxpayer strips" of our time.

In which case, maybe that's an advantage big boxes have over malls, at least in places with an "urbanizing" initiative: they're so utterly dispensable. By comparison, dead-and-now-redeveloped malls such as Warden Woods had a gallingly overbuilt white-elephantness to them...

 

[Tuscani01]

You wont see big box stores disappear for a longgggg time. It will take a major shift in consumer behaviour in order for this to happen, and current signs show that this shift isn't even close to occuring. If anything, we will be seeing even larger stores in the near future.

Canadian Tire Bay/Dundas for example is one of the most underperforming stores in the city, despite having the highest amount of foot traffic through the store. It just can't compete with the stores that are larger and offer greater product selection and parking. The only place where smaller stores are working are in the rural areas, and CT has developed a 'small concept store' and is building/has built a number of these stores in these smaller markets.

These stores wouldn't survive in the larger markets, because consumers demand more. Many people complain about big box developments, but actions speak much louder than words. Until companies start seeing consumers shift their spending/purchasing habits, big box stores will continue to thrive.

 

[Lenser]

I don't think anyone here is attempting to suggest that they are going the way of dodo any time soon. But the big box model meets special challenges when placed smack dab in the middle of a densifying city core that's attempting to make its street life more vibrant (more people-friendly, less car-friendly). It's not so much their existence as it is where they are located that's crucial.

Less people living in the city core own cars these days - for those with access to halfway decent public transit (or those who can't abide the sheer expense of keeping a car in the city - exorbitant insurance costs, soaring gas prices), going without a car can be seen as a lifestyle choice. When they need a car, they rent. When they need big-ticket items stuff gets delivered to their door. I expect that a new trend is coming; one in which big box stores located right downtown not be obliged to expend acres of otherwise valuable land for parking.

 

[Tuscani01]

I don't think anyone here is attempting to suggest that they are going the way of dodo any time soon. But the big box model meets special challenges when placed smack dab in the middle of a densifying city core that's attempting to make its street life more vibrant (more people-friendly, less car-friendly). It's not so much their existence as it is where they are located that's crucial.

Less people living in the city core own cars these days - for those with access to halfway decent public transit (or those who can't abide the sheer expense of keeping a car in the city - exorbitant insurance costs, soaring gas prices), going without a car can be seen as a lifestyle choice. When they need a car, they rent. When they need big-ticket items stuff gets delivered to their door. I expect that a new trend is coming; one in which big box stores located right downtown not be obliged to expend acres of otherwise valuable land for parking.

Well we don't have an issue with big box stores located downtown building acres of parking. They have so far been built with no parking.

 

[Lenser]

And can I get an amen for that!

I still don't like the aesthetics of big boxes, irrespective of where they're placed. But there are many businesses which almost specialize in looking ugly, so it's not as if they're establishing some unfortunate precedent. I'm thinking of those horrid instant cash depots scattered throughout the city, those junky electronics and tourist stores along Yonge St, most old-school appliance stores, home-brew computer stores... the list goes on.

 

[Hipster Duck]

With the exception of Home Depot, Rona, Costco and WalMart, aren't all the other typically big box stores located downtown in some kind of urban format? I mean, we have Future Shop, Best Buy, Canadian Tire, Winners, etc. already.

Except for WalMart, the ones that we don't have wouldn't really cater to urbanites, anyway. I mean, how many dowtown condo dwellers need to visit a Home Depot garden centre or buy a 15-pack of pork chops for their family of 4 kids?

 

[Tuscani01]

Except for WalMart, the ones that we don't have wouldn't really cater to urbanites, anyway. I mean, how many dowtown condo dwellers need to visit a Home Depot garden centre or buy a 15-pack of pork chops for their family of 4 kids?

More than you'd think.

Countless balconies in my building are dotted with planters and plants, as are balconies on other buildings. An urban format garden centre would probably do well downtown, especially if it catered to the condo dwellers. Home Depot wouldn't need the wood/drywall/interlocking etc. but everything else would probably sell well.

As for Costco and their bulk product... the concept does well in Vancouver, where Costco is located in the podium of a condo. I buy chicken breast at No Frills on King in bulk and freeze it for use throughout the week. Sure beats going grocery shopping every night. Costco would also come in handy for all those small ma and pa stores. My grandpa used to purchase product for his corner store from Costco as it was cheaper in some cases than going to the regular supplier.

 

[taal]

Curious if the Canadian tire does so bad is there a chance it may get closed downtown ?

What's the key factor, I'm guessing rent + the fact while the store attendance (not sure what the correct term is here) is very high, actually can you confirm this ? i.e. it is one of the more visited stores ? The problem being the purchases made per person are probably very low in comparison to the suburban location.


How about the location around Yonge and Bloor, its been there for a while ?

Along the same lines, do you know how best buy / future shop fare ? I'd imagine a little better as there are many more smaller items there that cost quite a bit ?


Size can't be the only issue though, King E is full of high end furniture stores, more then anywhere else in the GTA by far I'd guess in one area. Clearly there aren't products that are easy just to walk in and pick up, yet there is no parking or the like in the area.