Wal-Mart Supercenter and This Town's Businesses

A sign near the old location of Main Street Printing (they're in better quarters now, downtown, near the movie theater) reminded me of the "crisis" of Wal-Mart moving into town, in the spring of 2007. (Sauk Centre Journal archive, April 18, 2007)

Around that time someone I knew found out that I wasn't appalled and aghast that a major employer was building here. She asked me, rather fervently, if I didn't care if my town was destroyed.

"Destroyed" must mean different things to different people. New houses have been built since spring of 2007, when the Wal-Mart supercenter opened. The face of local businesses has changed, it's true. We now have an Ace Hardware store. It had been a few years since we'd had any hardware store in town - although Fleet Supply and Wal-Mart had (and have) pretty good hardware departments. (Sauk Centre Journal archive, January 7, 2009) And, Fleet Supply added more floorspace to its store in town.

If that's being "destroyed," I can live with it.


Retail land available in south Sauk Centre, near the Wal-Mart superstore. December 7, 2009.

What my friend had in mind, of course, was the utter and total devastation of all those mom-and-pop businesses that (presumably) are driven out of business when the big bad big-box store comes in.

I didn't see how that would happen here. We didn't have any low-end discount department stores in town, there hadn't been a hardware store here for years, and apart from repair shops and restaurants, there's not much else that is even close to being in direct competition with Wal-Mart.

The repair shops are, as far as I can tell, mostly still doing okay. I'm not surprised: they've been around for a while, and take pretty good care of their customers. (A 'shout out' for Flowers, on the north side - that's where this family takes our vehicles.)

On the other hand, with a Wal-Mart supercenter in town, folks come in off the interstate to shop there. Some of them fill their tanks (elsewhere), shop (elsewhere), catch a movie, and eat somewhere besides the in-house Subway. The Subway franchise on Main was there before Wal-Mart moved in, and still is.

We do have a department store downtown: Meads. It's a nice place, with a clientele who probably never go to Wal-Marts, or any other discount outfit.

My household? We shop at Wal-Mart. Like I said, Meads is nice - but generally out of our price range. Yep, we're a bunch of 'those people.'

Christmas Lights and Free Movies

Sunday, December 13, 2009. It's the third Sunday in Advent, with not-quite-two-weeks left until Christmas Day. This household is just about ready: my wife only had to remind me twice to get labels ready for the cards and letters.

I promised (warned?) Wednesday, that I had photos of Christmas lights.


Looks like these folks are using those new (for me) LED lights. December 7, 2009.


Neighborhood lights near the school. December 7, 2009.


Islands of light in the winter night. December 7, 2009.

Quite a few folks put some sort of display in their front yards. A few take another step, and light up their back yards, too.


Amazing, what you can do with a swing set in winter. December 8, 2009.

Another tip of the hat to Main Street Theatre - and local businesses - for those free Saturday matinee movies. The list of contributing businesses makes three columns on the posters you'll see around town. If I'm reading them right, I passed up an opportunity to see Monsters and Aliens yesterday. Actually, one of the "matinees" is in the morning: 10:00 a.m..

As I think I said before, it's a pretty good way of getting Christmas shopping done, making a family day of it, and not going crazy in the process.