The Home Town Advantage: How to Defend Your Main Street Against Chain Stores, and Why It Matters

The Home Town Advantage: How to Defend Your Main Street Against Chain Stores, and Why It Matters, Stacy Mitchell, Institute for Local Self-Reliance, 2000

A big-box retailer is interested in building a gazillion square foot MegaCenter on the outskirts of your small town. This book has a number of options to encourage that retailer to look elsewhere.

Big-box proponents like to talk about the jobs and tax revenue that the retailer will bring to town. This assumes, of course, that the town has not already approved a huge, multi-year tax break to encourage the retailer to build. Studies have shown that the rise in jobs and tax revenue that come from a big-box retailer are almost exactly offset by the lost jobs and tax revenue that will come from the Main Street businesses forced to close. Other studies have compared a dollar spent at a local business to a dollar spent at a big-box retailer. A much greater percentage of the locally spent dollar will stay in town than the big-box dollar, which will be wired to corporate HQ at the end of the day.

What can the average town do about it? Consider passing a town ordinance restricting all retail activity to downtown; big-box retailers like to build on the edge of town. Another possible ordinance will restrict retail stores to no more than a certain size, like 50,000 square feet. On a related subject, another possible ordinance can restrict, or ban, formula restaurants. These are businesses where, from one restaurant to another, the decor is the same, along with the food and the method of its preparation (like a fast food restaurant).

This is a short book, barely 100 pages, but it is full of information for any town who has been approached by a big-box retailer. It is a gem of a book.