Walgreens doesn’t look too ‘super’ for Porter Square
Cheer the free market all you want, but Pier 1 Imports leaving Porter Square to be replaced by a Walgreens is hard to take as a victory for anyone but KS Partners, the owners of 1 Porter Square.
The 21,000-square-foot, two-story Super Walgreens going in there — taking over not just Pier 1 Imports, but the long-empty space overhead that once was a Blockbuster Video — is literally across the street from a 24-hour CVS at 36 White St. It’s also less than a block away from a Shaw’s grocery store in the same plaza and the Gourmet Express Market and Deli, roughly a block away at 1868 Massachusetts Ave., which are both open 24 hours.
Theoretically, this kind of competition lowers the costs of goods and services, but there’s no evidence this has happened at the existing businesses and no reason to believe it will happen when the Walgreens opens.
Instead, Porter Square loses a business that was mostly unique in the area — its housewares and furniture had a bit of duplication at Tag’s Hardware — and gains one that promises to be precisely duplicative of the pharmacy, grocery and other services already in the area. Well, not just “in the area,” but across the street.
“Groceries, extensive cosmetics and aisles of prepared food such as Sushi are staples at other Super Walgreens, some of which even have their own hair and nail salons,” said The Real Reporter in March. (Shaw’s has groceries and even sushi, CVS has cosmetics and there are even hair and nail salons within spitting distance of the site.)
This sounds a lot like a miniature version of the retail pall that landed on Harvard Square over the past decade, except there it was banks rushing in to fill storefronts (an affliction that seeped down Massachusetts Avenue into Central Square as well). Harvard Square, though, is a tourist attraction, and Porter Square is much more a residents’ destination — except that now it’s significantly less so, since basically an entire category of lure to shoppers has been eliminated from the area (barring, again, the smaller assortment of wares at Tag’s and the vintage and used goods at the nearby Eddie’s Furniture, 95 Elm St.) in favor of more of the same stuff people can already get 24 hours a day. It light of it being Halloween season, this is like one house on the block that already has one kind of great candy announcing that it just got twice as much of the same great candy. It doesn’t mean everyone gets twice as much, and it doesn’t add a reason to go there.
It’s just more of the same stuff in one place.
Free market economy. If more people supported Pier 1 (and Blockbuster), they wouldn’t have left. If Walgreens didn’t know they were going to do well here they wouldn’t come. Everyone wants cutesy little stores to add to the vibe of an area, then they see the prices of the junk they sell, buy it online cheaper and bemoan the loss of the store. “Oh dear, I do so miss walking around Pier One, sipping my Starbucks and not buying anything. What a dreadful world.”
As the original story said, Pier 1 Imports was on a month-to-month lease and told to leave by the landlord in favor of Walgreens getting the space. Blockbuster closed its store as a result of financial problems; Pier 1 Imports “left” because its landlord told the company it must.
They were asked to leave bc they couldn’t pay as much as someone else could bc they don’t generate the same net income from the site that someone else can bc fewer people buy their stuff. Someone else valued the site more than they did and thus they are moving in. Blockbuster and a lot of other retail models are dead or someone would’ve moved in there instead of it sitting empty. Yours is the same silly point neighbors make regarding Walmart. If the majority in an area REALLY didn’t want a Walmart, you wouldn’t have to worry, they’d move in, nobody would shop there and god ole Moe’s Hardware and Fish Bait would continue to do fine. The sad reality is people as a whole will always put their interests ahead of the collective and businesses that cater to those interests best will grow, others will disappear. Unless we get wise and switch to a benevolent dictatorship but “The Rock” Obama needs to step it up in debate 2 for that to happen.
No argument: Again, this is a win for the landlord, and it’s entirely possible Walgreen Co. will find a way for this to be a win for its shareholders despite the directly duplicative competition. (Which is why this is unlike that point you mention about Wal-Mart coming to town.) How a Walgreens at 1 Porter Square is a win for consumers is, at best, unclear or yet to be seen.
In my opinion this is a win for the mall and the area. I would occasionally walk through Pier1 when leaving the gym but seldom bought any of that overpriced merchandise. Many years ago I worked at the Blockbuster Video mentioned in this article but given that companies financial troubles was not surprised to see that had left when I moved back to the area. I think the Walgreens will be a good addition and will bring some life to this half empty shopping center. Yeah CVS is a stone throw away but it will be good to have some options since that place is always crowded and perhaps a restaurant will move back into the space once occupied by UNO’s. This mall is in a great location directly across from Porter Sq T and Commuter rail stop with a parking lot for customers so I never really understood why it was so vacant. I look forward to the new additions.