Retail Watchers

If Dollar Tree has to start raising their prices, a dark horse competitor that could start eating into their business would be Daiso Japan, which is relatively limited in reach compared to Dollar Tree currently (mostly the US west coast with a few stores in Texas), but has already been selling items...

At some point in the last year 7-Eleven stores here seem to have consolidated down to a single set of cold cups that is used (and marked) for fountain soda, iced coffee and Slurpees. At times I have seen separate foam cups for Slurpees, but availability on those seems inconsistent, and most of the t...

Around here, all of the Chrysler products are now sold under one roof in the form of "CDJR" (Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram) dealers. Out of those a few also sell Fiats, and one dealer in Kirkland also sells Maserati and Alfa Romeo (which, aside from the Ferrari dealer in Seattle also selling Mas...

Costco has filed preliminary plans with the City of Seattle to open a new store in the former Sams Club location on Aurora Avenue: https://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2021/09/28/costco-aurora-new-store.html?ana=TRUEANTHEMFB_PS&csrc=6398&utm_campaign=trueAnthem%3A%20Trending%20Content&am...

In my experience, it's rare to see US Polo Assn. stuff outside of places like Ross or TJMaxx, so Walmart doesn't seem to be too much off of that. Although the brand is licensed by the actual US Polo Association, it has always felt like they were trying to piggyback off the Polo Ralph Lauren brand.

Pricing on parts can vary a lot from dealer to dealer. One thing I've noticed in particular is that a lot of dealers seem to sell parts 10% cheaper online than they would if you walked into the parts department and bought it there. In those cases, the best approach seems to be to order the parts onl...

There used to be a Zainy Brainy store in Redmond Town Center, which operated from around 1997-2001 or so (although my recollection may be a bit vague.) It was one of several stores from that era which I would put into the "Edutainment" category (basically a museum gift shop in a mall, this...

i can definitely see signs of consolidation around here. Roy Robinson (which previously owned several dealerships in Marysville) has recently sold their Subaru and Chevrolet dealerships to Kendall Auto Group (which also purchased a Ford dealership in Marysville under different ownership) after build...

I know Top Foods (Haggen) stores had self service scales in the bulk department to weigh and print tags way back in the late Nineties, so this would be nothing new. Winco (and I believe also Fred Meyer pre-COVID, last time I checked bulk foods still hadn't been reinstated at the one here) still rely...

Of course, it's not just restaurants having trouble finding people. Yesterday I went to a Sportsman's Warehouse store in Everett, and as I walked in immediately at the door I was greeted by an employee asking if I knew anyone looking for a job. I'm pretty sure that's the first time I've ever been as...