International Marketplace Point Roberts, WA

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storewanderer
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Re: International Marketplace Point Roberts, WA

Post by storewanderer »

kr.abs.swy wrote: July 1st, 2021, 9:05 am This one bothers me. This is a business that exists primarily to support tax avoidance on the part of Canadians, with a secondary benefit of serving a small community with a much larger grocery store than they would otherwise have. They aren't doing anything illegal (who is to say if the person buying a gallon of milk is from Tsawwassen or Point Roberts) but they clearly knew their business plan was based on people crossing the border. I wish them well, but I don't think they deserve a special bailout. They knew what they were getting into.
I don't think a 15 month border closure was expected. It is a clearly extraordinary situation. Even three months ago if you'd have asked me do you think the border will still be closed in July I'd have said no...

I guess I don't understand why they can't make some sort of a deal for Point Roberts residents - okay you can come enter Canada but you CANNOT stop anywhere and must proceed directly to US Border (whether the Blaine one or the Point Roberts one). The time entered Canada and time re-entered US could be tracked (these agencies surely talk to one another).

But that wouldn't solve the problem for the business in Point Roberts at all...
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Re: International Marketplace Point Roberts, WA

Post by kr.abs.swy »

Storewanderer, I don't disagree. But when your business plan is based on international citizens evading taxes, border closure or changes to border regulations ought to fall under the category of entrepreneurial risk. I've been in this store. It has a Canadian flag in its logo, is called "International Marketplace," and is on a strip of road where postal services are big business (Amazon deliveries to a U.S. address, etc.) and gas is priced in liters. I wish them well, but I don't see why the State of Washington ought to be propping up a store that makes its money from tax avoidance on the part of Canadians.
storewanderer wrote: July 1st, 2021, 10:51 pm
kr.abs.swy wrote: July 1st, 2021, 9:05 am This one bothers me. This is a business that exists primarily to support tax avoidance on the part of Canadians, with a secondary benefit of serving a small community with a much larger grocery store than they would otherwise have. They aren't doing anything illegal (who is to say if the person buying a gallon of milk is from Tsawwassen or Point Roberts) but they clearly knew their business plan was based on people crossing the border. I wish them well, but I don't think they deserve a special bailout. They knew what they were getting into.
I don't think a 15 month border closure was expected. It is a clearly extraordinary situation. Even three months ago if you'd have asked me do you think the border will still be closed in July I'd have said no...

I guess I don't understand why they can't make some sort of a deal for Point Roberts residents - okay you can come enter Canada but you CANNOT stop anywhere and must proceed directly to US Border (whether the Blaine one or the Point Roberts one). The time entered Canada and time re-entered US could be tracked (these agencies surely talk to one another).

But that wouldn't solve the problem for the business in Point Roberts at all...
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Re: International Marketplace Point Roberts, WA

Post by storewanderer »

kr.abs.swy wrote: July 3rd, 2021, 3:55 pm Storewanderer, I don't disagree. But when your business plan is based on international citizens evading taxes, border closure or changes to border regulations ought to fall under the category of entrepreneurial risk. I've been in this store. It has a Canadian flag in its logo, is called "International Marketplace," and is on a strip of road where postal services are big business (Amazon deliveries to a U.S. address, etc.) and gas is priced in liters. I wish them well, but I don't see why the State of Washington ought to be propping up a store that makes its money from tax avoidance on the part of Canadians.
I understand what you are saying. I am really impressed the store has lasted this long. Many businesses in this position would have been gone a year ago. So I would say they had some degree of staying power. If this loan isn't enough to keep the place going then we will see what happens next.

And I think the tax avoidance thing is a big reason why Canada has not been willing to do... anything... to help the situation here. Most of those parcel businesses look like mom and pop type of operations who probably have a far lower expense structure than a grocery store has so they are just waiting this thing out. Helping the situation in Point Roberts means making it easier for Canadians to roll across the border to buy certain grocery items and gasoline at lower prices than they get in Canada. Canada is probably trying to figure out a way to make that stop happening...

I too was in Point Roberts and it was a quite interesting place... never seen anything quite like it before. Because there isn't anything quite like it.
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Re: International Marketplace Point Roberts, WA

Post by buckguy »

A business model based on exploiting differences in policy through a border location is always going to be a gamble and not necessarily one that a taxpayer should bailout. The same thing happens at state borders---differences in gas or tobacco taxes. On long trips, I used to notice that adult book stores would turn up on desolate freeway exits right around county lines and figured the same was true of liquor places in odd locations. Again, these are business models that exploit a difference that easily can be erased by new policies or enforcement decisions. The risk needs to be assumed by the owner and built into their model. The US/Canadian border has always had a great deal of open-ness but that has been diminishing over time, so even that is not a given.

US businesses in places like Burlington Vermont or the Buffalo-Niagara Falls area have had a long ride on this sort of thing, but there was a time when people would go to Canada for the bargains, too, when the exchange rate was more favorable in that direction. When I was a kid, people would drive three very boring hours to Niagara Falls to buy fireworks (immigration rarely even asked for a drivers license in those days, let alone looked in a trunk) and pick up obscurities like Smarties candies (always popular to handout at Halloween) or brands of beer and other beverages not sold in the US.
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Re: International Marketplace Point Roberts, WA

Post by Brian Lutz »

If the store's business model is primarily dependent on people crossing the border to shop for items at cheaper prices, that's one thing, and wouldn't seem to justify the type of bailout being provided here. Then again, if you believe the theory that many of the permanent residents of Point Roberts are members of the Witness Protection Program who may be at risk if they were to leave Point Roberts it makes more sense that there may be a strategic need to keep a store in Point Roberts.
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Re: International Marketplace Point Roberts, WA

Post by storewanderer »

Brian Lutz wrote: July 4th, 2021, 11:41 am If the store's business model is primarily dependent on people crossing the border to shop for items at cheaper prices, that's one thing, and wouldn't seem to justify the type of bailout being provided here. Then again, if you believe the theory that many of the permanent residents of Point Roberts are members of the Witness Protection Program who may be at risk if they were to leave Point Roberts it makes more sense that there may be a strategic need to keep a store in Point Roberts.
More on that in this article:
https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/2019 ... ugh-canada
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Re: International Marketplace Point Roberts, WA

Post by veteran+ »

storewanderer wrote: July 4th, 2021, 7:22 pm
Brian Lutz wrote: July 4th, 2021, 11:41 am If the store's business model is primarily dependent on people crossing the border to shop for items at cheaper prices, that's one thing, and wouldn't seem to justify the type of bailout being provided here. Then again, if you believe the theory that many of the permanent residents of Point Roberts are members of the Witness Protection Program who may be at risk if they were to leave Point Roberts it makes more sense that there may be a strategic need to keep a store in Point Roberts.
More on that in this article:
https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/2019 ... ugh-canada
Wow.......................................very interesting!
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