24 thoughts on “We most certainly need more historical markers like this one.”
Yes, we certainly do need to draw attention to vanishing local economies and signs like this would definitely do the trick. I wonder how many “candidates” for this identification surround Williston?
JD, that was great. Loved it.
I find this sign silly. It reflects antipathy toward one company that built itself up in a classic sense, just like every small but somehow more worthy company wants to.
It should read “On this site stood a dinosaur which couldn’t adapt to the reality around it.”
If this referred to a car company, bigger and foreign-built would apparently be fine. Who wants to buy a car made completely in East Podunk, Vermont? Even if such a company existed, its costs would be prohibitive. If it still made a decent product, people would pay more for it – it’s called “custom car.”
If this referred to a grocery store, bigger and cheaper would absolutely be fine. A small mom-and-pop store with 200 square feet of space wouldn’t work for anyone – that’s why they’ve all gone out of business. You can still have a small store, but you have to be better than the big one. Whole Foods succeeds because it provided a better option than PriceChopper – but at a premium price. (and the “Organic” tag is a complete joke – mostly an indicator of massive agricultural operations that have eliminated thousands of small farmers – oops.)
The local hardware store around here was Aubuchon’s, a large chain with high prices and lousy service. It got replaced with a Home Depot low prices and good service (around here somewhere). The computer guy – Office Depot. The bookstore – B&N or WaldenBooks, which are now losing to Amazon.com and e-books. The Florist with a greenhouse is replaced by one with global shipments coming in daily from Columbia and other, warmer places.
Adapt and live, people.
Whine and go bankrupt.
The world doesn’t owe you a living just because you are white and graduated from the local school to open a tiny store with too-high prices and an attitude, selling things that you purchased wholesale from a company in Indiana who contracted out to Pakistan or Mexico or China … “Assembled in the USA!”
WalMart succeeds because people go there. These people aren’t making a political or ideological point, they are making a purchase. If your store goes out of business to the big box, it is your customers who are doing you in. Read the tea leaves and change accordingly.
Into Rutland: Hannafords, Bed Bath Beyond, Dicks, Home Depot, CVS, Walgreens, Verizon Wireless, 99, Holiday Inn (et al)
Out of Business: Grand Union, Ames, P&C, porno shop, Aubuchon, Noble Hardware, Mintzer Bros, BookKing.
Small Business who lived: Rutland Pharmacy, restaurants, stores on Center street,
Think about where you bought your last book, camera, rose, can of paint, chocolate, clock, linens. All little, local stores with no branches? Who holds your mortgage, the local bank providing local jobs or one in Delaware screwing over the country? Do you have a credit card? Have you ever purchased gas from Citgo, Shell, BP? Are all of these companies properly “unionized”? Are these businesses making money while streamlining the logistics to lower prices and still be a decent wage for most of its staff.
Didn’t think so.
truth set out bold like that makes me feel kinda odd.
You are all focusing on the dream of Vermont and New England as you’d like it to be, on a “more cows than people” fantasy.
I know what the company pays. When you say that “and if he thinks employees of big box stores make a ‘decent wage’ then I guess he’s unaware of how many qualify for Medicaid and other types of public assistance”, you fail to see my point. It’s not a decent wage but it’s better than that paid by the stores who were failing around town. It doesn’t have health care but neither did mom-and-pop. It might not be great but it sure beats the empty lot that was there.
“you could still get things at Service Merchandise significantly cheaper” — exactly how is one giant chain that much better than another?
“but the lemmings still headed for the cliff” This is just too condescending, don’t you think? Do you really have this much trouble letting people choose for themselves without asking for your wisdom?
“oh yeah, there’s also that pesky transportation thing; you know, shipping stuff all over the world using a depleting resource that’s killing the planet (and for which we go to war”
How on Earth do you think Hannaford’s gets their tomatoes, fruit, bread, Australian wine, korean kimchi, meat, etc. this time of year? Or the Florist their Columbian flowers? or the car dealer all of his inventory? If you are truly telling me you’d rather not ship anything more than, say, a hundred miles, I’m not sure that the US would be as wealthy as a third-world country. There’s certainly not enough produced in the middle of Vermont to sever all of our transport options.
There are many who have no other choice, especially once Walmart has displaced all of the other options;
A large store brings in business. I’m not familiar with your personal situation but Rutland was a dump and the introduction of PriceChopper, Hannaford’s and Walmart has saved that city. Many little stores closed but not because of Walmart. They were already dead. Amazon killed the Book King. Online killed the banks.
Walmart most certainly embraces an ideology, a ruthless, free-market, anti-worker one. You obviously either don’t equate your shopping choices with where you shop, or you just don’t care. I’m inclined to think it’s the latter.
I’m inclined to ask people who actually work there and not make too many assumptions about the motivations and intentions of others. I talked to store owners around this town and others who had a WM move in. All of the ones I spoke with said they hated it at first and then realized that it brought in people. Lots of people.
I suspect that will change in a generation or so as the fundamental foundation of this pyramid scheme we call our economy has been undermined by the transfer of worker bee positions to the least expensive denominator, which doesn’t do much for our standard of living or global position.
Sounds deep and insightful. I will wait for that generational shift like everyone and hope for the best. In the meantime, what do you have for all the people who shop there and work there?
Before you condemn them as idiots and losers because they don’t share your attitudes, notice that the little appliance store down the street is doing fine, the Home Depot is cranking, the restaurants and shops are doing well, the Paramount Theater is re-opened and the other neighboring stores are still alive. The town is rebuilding and even the Amtrack is running.
I paint what I see.
and is probably intentionally so… but the growth of the Walmart business approach, or rather the birth of it, marks something significant in the business cycle.
Aside from the pyramid comments, Just like Jim Doesless has attempted to start with the local government, there is now an atmosphere to use this effective monopoly of purchasing power and price setting to DEFLATE everything in our economy, except apparently the price of energy. The advent of a company that had enough market share to be able to say to Mattel or JuiceOmatic “sell it at this price or we will just go to China and have a zillion made ourselves” and be able to back it up is sorta new. The domino that rolls down to local wage and buying power forces folks to sacrifice either quality or service, which is what you get at Walmart… The superstore concept is just a next step development of the Mall concept of the 50s.. everything under one roof. Apparently WalMall was not judged to be as attractive as WalMart, but they basically just built a mall completely owned by one entity. The lemmings ran there for convenience and the belief in the LOW PRICE advertising hook. I am not sure either were really true…
To the more Vermont issue, a good part of our economy is built on tourist type folk coming to see the more cows than people, Country store, folk laden landscape. Stowe is building the AIG version of the Alps…. another form of Walmart… another mega company taking over the local motel business….
I don’t know where it stops or goes from here… The post on the Hudson River buildings has a little interest in terms of transition…… I doubt they will ever go away. Walmart is downsizing into local grocery markets now.. A continuation of the “we must own everything” idea… and the tea baggers think a fear of government is the best thing going… Once you get a wallyworld bank going, all will be lost. A true closed system. Sorry for the disjointed flight of ideas…
Hats off to MLK on his DAY.. I doubt this was his Dream.
Yes, we certainly do need to draw attention to vanishing local economies and signs like this would definitely do the trick. I wonder how many “candidates” for this identification surround Williston?
JD, that was great. Loved it.
I find this sign silly. It reflects antipathy toward one company that built itself up in a classic sense, just like every small but somehow more worthy company wants to.
It should read “On this site stood a dinosaur which couldn’t adapt to the reality around it.”
If this referred to a car company, bigger and foreign-built would apparently be fine. Who wants to buy a car made completely in East Podunk, Vermont? Even if such a company existed, its costs would be prohibitive. If it still made a decent product, people would pay more for it – it’s called “custom car.”
If this referred to a grocery store, bigger and cheaper would absolutely be fine. A small mom-and-pop store with 200 square feet of space wouldn’t work for anyone – that’s why they’ve all gone out of business. You can still have a small store, but you have to be better than the big one. Whole Foods succeeds because it provided a better option than PriceChopper – but at a premium price. (and the “Organic” tag is a complete joke – mostly an indicator of massive agricultural operations that have eliminated thousands of small farmers – oops.)
The local hardware store around here was Aubuchon’s, a large chain with high prices and lousy service. It got replaced with a Home Depot low prices and good service (around here somewhere). The computer guy – Office Depot. The bookstore – B&N or WaldenBooks, which are now losing to Amazon.com and e-books. The Florist with a greenhouse is replaced by one with global shipments coming in daily from Columbia and other, warmer places.
Adapt and live, people.
Whine and go bankrupt.
The world doesn’t owe you a living just because you are white and graduated from the local school to open a tiny store with too-high prices and an attitude, selling things that you purchased wholesale from a company in Indiana who contracted out to Pakistan or Mexico or China … “Assembled in the USA!”
WalMart succeeds because people go there. These people aren’t making a political or ideological point, they are making a purchase. If your store goes out of business to the big box, it is your customers who are doing you in. Read the tea leaves and change accordingly.
Into Rutland: Hannafords, Bed Bath Beyond, Dicks, Home Depot, CVS, Walgreens, Verizon Wireless, 99, Holiday Inn (et al)
Out of Business: Grand Union, Ames, P&C, porno shop, Aubuchon, Noble Hardware, Mintzer Bros, BookKing.
Small Business who lived: Rutland Pharmacy, restaurants, stores on Center street,
Think about where you bought your last book, camera, rose, can of paint, chocolate, clock, linens. All little, local stores with no branches? Who holds your mortgage, the local bank providing local jobs or one in Delaware screwing over the country? Do you have a credit card? Have you ever purchased gas from Citgo, Shell, BP? Are all of these companies properly “unionized”? Are these businesses making money while streamlining the logistics to lower prices and still be a decent wage for most of its staff.
Didn’t think so.
truth set out bold like that makes me feel kinda odd.
You are all focusing on the dream of Vermont and New England as you’d like it to be, on a “more cows than people” fantasy.
I know what the company pays. When you say that “and if he thinks employees of big box stores make a ‘decent wage’ then I guess he’s unaware of how many qualify for Medicaid and other types of public assistance”, you fail to see my point. It’s not a decent wage but it’s better than that paid by the stores who were failing around town. It doesn’t have health care but neither did mom-and-pop. It might not be great but it sure beats the empty lot that was there.
“you could still get things at Service Merchandise significantly cheaper” — exactly how is one giant chain that much better than another?
“but the lemmings still headed for the cliff” This is just too condescending, don’t you think? Do you really have this much trouble letting people choose for themselves without asking for your wisdom?
How on Earth do you think Hannaford’s gets their tomatoes, fruit, bread, Australian wine, korean kimchi, meat, etc. this time of year? Or the Florist their Columbian flowers? or the car dealer all of his inventory? If you are truly telling me you’d rather not ship anything more than, say, a hundred miles, I’m not sure that the US would be as wealthy as a third-world country. There’s certainly not enough produced in the middle of Vermont to sever all of our transport options.
A large store brings in business. I’m not familiar with your personal situation but Rutland was a dump and the introduction of PriceChopper, Hannaford’s and Walmart has saved that city. Many little stores closed but not because of Walmart. They were already dead. Amazon killed the Book King. Online killed the banks.
I’m inclined to ask people who actually work there and not make too many assumptions about the motivations and intentions of others. I talked to store owners around this town and others who had a WM move in. All of the ones I spoke with said they hated it at first and then realized that it brought in people. Lots of people.
Sounds deep and insightful. I will wait for that generational shift like everyone and hope for the best. In the meantime, what do you have for all the people who shop there and work there?
Before you condemn them as idiots and losers because they don’t share your attitudes, notice that the little appliance store down the street is doing fine, the Home Depot is cranking, the restaurants and shops are doing well, the Paramount Theater is re-opened and the other neighboring stores are still alive. The town is rebuilding and even the Amtrack is running.
I paint what I see.
and is probably intentionally so… but the growth of the Walmart business approach, or rather the birth of it, marks something significant in the business cycle.
Aside from the pyramid comments, Just like Jim Doesless has attempted to start with the local government, there is now an atmosphere to use this effective monopoly of purchasing power and price setting to DEFLATE everything in our economy, except apparently the price of energy. The advent of a company that had enough market share to be able to say to Mattel or JuiceOmatic “sell it at this price or we will just go to China and have a zillion made ourselves” and be able to back it up is sorta new. The domino that rolls down to local wage and buying power forces folks to sacrifice either quality or service, which is what you get at Walmart… The superstore concept is just a next step development of the Mall concept of the 50s.. everything under one roof. Apparently WalMall was not judged to be as attractive as WalMart, but they basically just built a mall completely owned by one entity. The lemmings ran there for convenience and the belief in the LOW PRICE advertising hook. I am not sure either were really true…
To the more Vermont issue, a good part of our economy is built on tourist type folk coming to see the more cows than people, Country store, folk laden landscape. Stowe is building the AIG version of the Alps…. another form of Walmart… another mega company taking over the local motel business….
I don’t know where it stops or goes from here… The post on the Hudson River buildings has a little interest in terms of transition…… I doubt they will ever go away. Walmart is downsizing into local grocery markets now.. A continuation of the “we must own everything” idea… and the tea baggers think a fear of government is the best thing going… Once you get a wallyworld bank going, all will be lost. A true closed system. Sorry for the disjointed flight of ideas…
Hats off to MLK on his DAY.. I doubt this was his Dream.