Put Your Money Where Your House Is.

Kevin Coolidge

The old timer took a thoughtful draw on his pipe, and began, “I remember a quaint, quiet town and green, wooded hills. I never called ‘em mountains. That was always a sure sign of a flatlander to me. Move here, open a business and then name it something with a mountain in it. Nah, it’s the rolling hills of Pennsylvania. I love ‘em, but they’re not mountains. Then ‘progress’ arrived, and we lost the five & dime, but got one of those fluorescent filled, 24 hours a day monsters built like an oversize shoe box. As if I’d want to buy cheap Chinese crap at three in the morning. My local druggist knew my name, and I could grab a phosphate and catch up on local gossip, that was back before my sugar kicked in. Guess you can’t fight progress. You can’t fight change...”

I grew up remembering a vibrant Main Street. Many of those stores are gone, some have been replaced, some have been remodeled and some have remained lifeless lots. I’m hoping that the forthcoming Deane Center will pump new blood into Wellsboro, and that the Mansfield Downtown Development Corporation will aid in the revitalization of a downtown Mansfield even better than what I remember. Change is coming to Tioga County, but only with guidance and hard work are we going to be able to call it progress.

Anyone who cares about American main streets and the preservation of locally-owned small businesses should read The Home Town Advantage by Stacy Mitchell. Perhaps, you have mourned the loss of a locally-owned business, but accepted it as market evolution. After all, large corporations with their vast buying power and global reach offer more convenience and lower prices, and bring jobs to rural economies as well as tax revenues for local government, right?

Under closer scrutiny, however, these “truths” turn out to be far less convincing. Large chains reduce the diversity of locally-owned shops, and leave the customer at the mercy of an absentee-owned firm’s decisions on what items to stock, what prices to charge, and how long they’ll stay. When the going gets tough, many of these box stores abandon the community. More than one small town has seen this happen during the recent economic downturn. What do you do with a 120,000 square foot “ghost box”? Local officials who eagerly court giant retailers with huge tax incentives may discover that the public costs outweigh the public gains.

We live in a dynamic and ever-changing market economy, and no business is guaranteed. Retail and service aggressively compete for customers, but in the last two decades retail ownership has undergone a dramatic shift: from local independent merchants to national chains. Books, groceries, hardware, clothing and many other goods are now sold primarily through giant retail companies.

Sometimes this is the result of market forces with the new and efficient displacing the old and defunct. But just as often it is the result of large corporations being given unfair advantages. When Amazon.com can sell books over the internet and avoid paying state and local taxes, it gains a six percent price advantage. When Borders receive price breaks from publishers that exceed those justified by their larger book orders, it is gaining not just an unfair advantage over smaller, local stores, but is illegal under current antitrust statutes. When Wal-Mart arrives on the outskirts of town, and receives tax abatements, free roads and sewer, it is gaining an unwarranted advantage over local merchants who are, in effect, watching their taxes go to subsidize a competitor.

Small merchants care about their communities more because they are part of those communities. The taxes they pay provide services like schools and parks. Small businesses give to community causes more than their big competitors and their profits and purchases tend to circulate within and strengthen the local economy rather than flowing to corporate headquarters. In addition to Mitchell’s Home Town Advantage, the many ways that small businesses outperform their “big box” competition receive detailed coverage in Michael Shuman’s 2006 book, The Small-Mart Revolution.

The trends are discouraging, but trends are not destiny. It’s not just time to change the rules; it’s time to change the game. Local merchants still hold a share of the market for goods and services, but citizens need to act now to ensure the survival of local retail and service businesses. Many communities have begun fashioning policies that favor diverse, locally owned businesses, and The Home Town Advantage describes the tools they are using and discusses ways in which local business, in partnership with local governments, can once again become key components in a healthy and self-sustained retail sector.

Wish in one hand. Hope in the other? Or take some action? Email me at from_my_shelf@yahoo.com We are your hometown columnists; to reminisce over our past columns, check out http://frommyshelf.blogspot.com. Hobo’s a local kitten born right here in Tioga County. You can buy his book, “Hobo Finds A Home”, but not in Wal-Mart...