by problembear
during the current economic collapse there will be a few winners, some survivors and a passel of losers. who will survive? and why? what makes some businesses more successful than others?
if you get an extra good feeling about entering a grocery store in missoula chances are that store is Orange Street Food Farm. stand in line with your loaf of Le Petit Outre Champaigne bread and your gallon of 1% milk and a six pack of Moose Drool and chances are there are many people who know you. the conversation is flowing at every check stand while folks exchange greetings and catch up with each other. the employees are relaxed and friendly, the musak is usually upbeat motown or high energy oldies. the produce is fresh, the beer is well stocked, even the meat department has approached Rosauer like quality at much better prices in the past couple of years. it just feels good to shop there. what is your favorite business in your town and why do you think it will survive? or do you? if so, why? if not-why not?
January 7, 2009 at 6:18 pm
Wal-mart will survive. I’ve done a lot of price comparisons with the other grocery stores in town, and many of the items I buy regularly are indeed 15% or more cheaper there. Often when I shop at other grocery stores for whatever reasons, I wanna pick up something but I just cant bring myself to pay the higher price when I know I can pay so much less across town.
So now I’ve outed myself as a Wal-mart shopper…so politically incorrect for a liberal like myself, I better go put on my asbestos suit…
but I agree with you about the food farm. If I could live on only beer I’d shop there all the time.
January 7, 2009 at 7:12 pm
brave foolish man, Jim. :-)
Rosauer’s is closer to my house, and I shop there rather than the Albertson’s or Safeway. Rosauer’s is employee-owned. Albertson’s and Safeway,while union, really stick it to Montana employees versus what they are paying in $ and benefits in Washington State.
I do like buying my six-packs (as frequently as that is done) at Orange St., though. Nice selection and prices are great.
January 7, 2009 at 8:51 pm
The rasta guy with the mean green
Always a hit during unemployment.
January 7, 2009 at 9:17 pm
Okay, seriously, the student hangouts will survive. UM will have a fresh crop of students every semester, no matter the economy, so Laz’s bar will survive, (hey I don’t know the name…) and a big greasy burger and a bottled beer while watching sports is a cheap way to spend an unemployed saturday. I hope that place where I had the cheap burritos out in some strip mall on Reserve makes it.
In Bozeman, “Stoner corner” by the high school will continue to have a steady clientele. As a consequence, and also do to my patronage, five dollar footlongs across from the highschool will be a constant.
Mac’s Barbershop will survive, ten dollar haircuts….check out Max Baucus’ coif after a Bozeman visit.
Bridger Bowl will continue and survive, in spite of expanding at exactly the wrong time.
Two favorite businesses, World Boards, and Music Villa, represent the best of local, customer, and youth and parent oriented businesses. They will struggle but survive because the kids will continue to snowboard and the strong music programs in the school will continue.
I don’t see how all the grocery stores will make it. Town and Country will expand, and they will triumph even over WalMart. Their new adaptive reuse across from the college in the old Campus Square Cinemas will be a huge hit.
Certainly at least one of the big box or other home improvement stores will disappear; Lowe’s is not well liked, Home Depot’s a ghost town, and I don’t know who buys at Zigs. At least one office supply place if not two or three, will close.
Which ten restaurants in town will disappear in the next year? Two I hope will not are Ferraro’s Fine Eyetalian, a place where I can have a drink and a conversation, and Bar Three Barbeque, which has great chicken and brisket and homemade pickles, and a sad backstory.
January 7, 2009 at 9:30 pm
What’s that jackass Irish wannabe bar on the main drag in Bozeman? I hope that place goes under.
January 7, 2009 at 10:00 pm
Can’t say. Not a place I go to.
January 7, 2009 at 11:39 pm
I’m a believer in Rockin Rudy’s. Bruce, the owner, has weathered a far worse economic crisis in his particular line of business than the broader economy is now facing, and he has smartly adjusted at just the right times in just the right ways. For an aging music fan like me, it’s sad to see how small the CD section of his store now is; but I can’t blame him a bit, and in fact I applaud the fact that he’s figured out how to still sell music and stay afloat in this day’n'age.
January 8, 2009 at 6:42 am
Maybe we fill vacant storefronts with new gun and ammo outlets.
January 8, 2009 at 12:27 pm
swede- the gun guys are saturated already here but as businesses collapse i see that pawn shops, tattoo parlors, casinos and payday loan places are swooping in and laying their eggs all over town….you just can’t kill cockroaches- they thrive in the most toxic environs.
January 8, 2009 at 3:09 pm
BS, cheap and vacant storefronts make for good offices for a new generation of budding nonprofits.
January 8, 2009 at 6:16 pm
jc- first of all no real estate moguls or landlords are lowering rent anywhere near reality yet in missoula – so no cheap storefronts; and secondly, non profits are hurting big time from the bushcrash. less money means less donations means less non profits. many of the empty spaces will remain dark for quite awhile.
January 8, 2009 at 7:59 pm
Gotta be empty storefronts before we see a rent correction, in downtown bozeman too.
As for non profits, the six hundred some in Gallatin co are in for a rough ride.
Gotta be some “for profits” who make the money they’re willing to donate, right?
January 8, 2009 at 8:20 pm
when i owned my own business my banker only had one sentence of advice:” spend less money than you make.”
didn’t listen to him. always figured if i spent it first the money would come- 200,000.00 later and 8 years of 70hr plus per week, i discovered i was no businessman, goof. have a ton of respect for those who can though, and yeah, that is the only hope for america when all is said and done- successful small businesses with 50 employees or less are the foundation of any recovery. let’s all do what we can to support the good ones… excellent customer service will win the day. nothing mediocre will survive…
January 8, 2009 at 10:28 pm
pb, I can point to a dozen places and storefronts in Missoula where new nonprofits got established during the recession of the ’80s. Most of them were vacated by defunct businesses. Actually, starting nonprofits is a valuable type of economic development while in and coming out of a recession. Creates jobs just like any other business. Takes a real entrepreneur to start a viable nonprofit.
Goof, all nonprofits need to be run like any other business or they’ll tank. A well run nonprofit operates as smoothly as any other productive business, and creates a niche within the community within which it provides valuable services.
I find it very humorous when folks run out the old ” ‘for profits’ who make the money they’re willing to donate” line, when the biggest charade of all is the Wall Street “nonprofits” that just soaked up 350 billion dollars without providing a single service like a hot meal or a warm place to sleep for the homeless, or health care.
January 8, 2009 at 10:43 pm
sure hope you are right jc. you are much more optimistic than i am. we will need all the jobs we can scrape up in the next year or two…looks like we dodged a bullet in missoula for now concerning Macy’s downtown store. eleven macy’s closing but missoula’s store survived this round of cuts tonight.
January 8, 2009 at 10:50 pm
JC, your strawman about Wall Street just shows how weak your arguments are.
You saw problembear’s post about small business, and he’s right. I know it’s small, local businesses, like problembear talked about, that keep the non profits afloat, and without them, the non profits don’t make it .
I’ve worked for a non profit, volunteered for plenty, and served on the BOD of another and get frequent requests to serve on others. Whether it’s local builders building a homeless shelter or local bike and ski shops outfitting Big Sky Youth Empowerment’s saving troubled teens, it’s local businessmen that support the critical non profits.
I admit there are some non profits suckling at the teat of the federal government, but that, after all, is a charade larger than even Wall Street.
January 9, 2009 at 8:31 am
I admit there are some non profits suckling at the teat of the federal government, but that, after all, is a charade larger than even Wall Street.
what a load of bullshit. there is no larger charade than Wall Street. I would like some examples of suckling non-profits that have wreaked the kind of havoc Wall Street has to back up such a ridiculous comment.
January 9, 2009 at 10:53 am
I reckon that the bigger credit unions and regional banks will do well. They didn’t make the crazy loans and are well positioned to help folks in these tough times. Besides, there’s something good about doing your financial transactions with local organizations where profits go back into our community, isn’t there?
Oh yeah, and credit unions, electrical and telephone co-operatives are non-profits, too. They don’t ship dividends to out-of-state shareholders, nope.
January 9, 2009 at 12:33 pm
Binky, you’re spot-on about cooperatives. They are one of the success stories that came out of the Great Depression, and are as relevant today as they were 75 years ago.
To that list you can add local agriculture. Everybody’s got to eat, and in a down economy, reliance on local production is the smart choice. The local farmer’s markets should do well.
January 9, 2009 at 1:00 pm
When they’re well-run, co-ops work really well for just about everything. Unfortunately the real pioneer for food co-ops — Hyde Park Cooperative on the South Side of Chicago — went under last year because of incompetence.
Actually, I’m astonished that there are no housing cooperatives (other than the Atlantic, sort of) here with the inflated housing prices and the university presence. It wouldn’t be hard to get a NASCO grant to buy a big house near the U and create one. Are any student leaders listening?
January 9, 2009 at 1:35 pm
Bozeman Food co-op lays off 27.
January 9, 2009 at 4:21 pm
Wow. Good catch jhwygirl. The Bozeman Co-op is taking a big hit. The interesting stat in the Gazette article is that they normally have an attrition of 20 employees during the holidays, but only had 4 this season. So 16 of the 27 layoffs were because people were trying to hold tight to their jobs.
I guess another way to look at it is that people aren’t able to find other jobs, so they are staying put–until they are laid off, that is.
In any case, that shoots a big hole in my co-op theory. Not sure how that would translate to credit unions and electric co-ops.
Are people just not buying food at the Bozeman Co-op because it is pricey, or that people are shifting their purchases to places like Wal-Mart? Or are people just not spending money at the Deli and for high end big-markup products like designer beers and fancy vitamins? It would be interesting to here Brady Wiseman’s take on this.
Oh, and some self disclosure: before the trustafarian/yuppie takeover in Bozeman, and in the cowboy-hippy era, I was one of the first batch of members of the Crossroads Food Center in the hovel on S. Wallace, which grew into the Bozeman Co-op. Sweet nostalgia.
January 9, 2009 at 4:24 pm
I read too much news. I had (have) another regarding the co-op, but that’s for tomorrows V&S…
I wonder how Missoula’s Co-op is doing?
January 9, 2009 at 5:01 pm
one thing to keep in mind- contractor’s and sub-contractors like builders, framers, sheetrockers, plumbers, electricians, landscapers, excavators, flooring installers, painters etc are not necessarily included in the government’s unemployment statistics and most of them have never relied on government for anything so they may not ever show up but believe me that they are hurting now. each one of them is an individual business buying fuel, insurance, materials, supplies etc. don’t forget individual contractors who are timber haulers who own their own log truck, contract loggers, contract forestors…there is a huge contractor base of employment out there that is not reflected in the unemployment figures so when i read 6% unemployment, i double it to 12% and that seems about right for now….later this year when government figures show 10-12% unemployment, the truer figure is closer to 20-25%. when mills shut down and houses don’t get built contractors sit. they can do it for awhile because they are a resourceful bunch of rugged individuals who are usually prepared for occasional layoffs. but this depression will test the best of them.
January 9, 2009 at 7:11 pm
Brady Wiseman is a legislator. It’s the other Wiseman, Kelly, who runs the Co-Op.
I’ve been a Bozeman Community Food Co-Op member since 1979 or 1980. Used to sweep out the mouse turdies with the rice grains on the floor over there off South Wallace near the cemetery. My longest and most dedicated stint was as a cashier for a couple of years at the college location.
Back when Dana was the ONE employee, before Kelly Wiseman, when it was really just a place to buy cheap bulk foods, that peppermint soap, and real maple syrup.
The Co-op IS pricey and has become quite boutique-ey, with it’s deli and coffee shop and high end chocolate and cosmetics and beer. I am sure people are buying some organics and bulk at Town and Country, which can be cheaper than the co-op, although not always, and it’s also locally, even employee owned, and is more basic.
The Co-Op needs to get back to basics as well; lots fewer employees and more working members. Kelly can be a fairly tough minded business person and I’m thinking he will look out for the business, even if it does mean more layoffs and hunkering down on expenses.
problembear I’ve got a friend who has had a sand and gravel hauling biz. He was the canary in the coal mine for me, as his business dried up and people stopped paying in 2007. If they’re not hauling gravel for the new roads and new sewer lines and other infrastructure, likely they’re not gonna build houses and commercial buildings the next year. Anyway he fits your description to a tee.
January 9, 2009 at 11:29 pm
a gathering storm goof. the pressure is dropping and this bear’s back fur is starting to stand straight up. gonna be some real pain out there and the best are gonna be tested.
January 9, 2009 at 11:39 pm
Duh, brain fart. Thanks, Goof. Kelly, not Brady. And I go back to high school with those guys.
We must have crossed many a path in those days, Goof. I was a cashier in the old building on S. Wallace, and unloaded bunches of trucks and stocked shelves.
January 10, 2009 at 12:20 am
weapons manufacturers will do just fine. I say that after seeing pictures of white phosphorous shells exploding over gaza.
no comment on that Wall Street comparison to non-profit sucklers I see. omissions speak loudly.
I don’t want to pass on any hip-strip heresy, but my wife is increasingly disappointed with the trajectory of Betty’s Divine. Don’t rainbow end yourselves by high-ending for college hipster/highrollers. Stay diversified!
January 10, 2009 at 7:57 am
Well, lizard, I’m just not a long argument/last word guy. It’s not the non profit piglets but the federal govt hog to which I referred.
You had your chance for the last word. If you look at “Wall Street” over it’s long history, you’ll see plenty of reasons why and how the capital it transferred enabled employers of tens, if not hundreds of millions and the creation of huge amounts of wealth for many, including a large middle class in this country. Recently, some of those employers and a chunk of that wealth has disappeared, it’s true. But historically, your pro communist anti capitalism argument is bullshit. It will be buried on the ash heap of history just as Nikita was.
January 10, 2009 at 7:48 pm
I’m pro community and anti greed, goof. calling me pro communist is just a sad attempt from the right of the political spectrum to color any criticism of out-of-control greed (Wall Street) as pro communist. Goof, this isn’t the fifties, so please upgrade your outdated characterizations of critics of capitalism.
hopefully what will be buried by the ash heap of history is the bullshit free market/greed-is-good ideologues.
January 11, 2009 at 10:02 pm
Hey problembear, you sound a lot like this guy:
“Retail is just the “face” of a slowing economy. There’s plenty of “back office” type businesses closing; little public face, but quite a few jobs lost just the same. Even our little local Gubmint is in a constant state of layoffs.
We’re at 10% unemployment, businesses are closing so fast it’s hard to keep count, we’ve watched our local medians drop from $396,000 to $226,000. OK, this is the shit storm this blog has been yammering on about for 2 years as INEVITABLE. It’s here. This is it. And NO, it is not even close to ending. The damage is not even close to being done.”
I read him because I know his subject. I can only hope he’s wrong… but when I compare Struckman’s article at New West to your response and others, and to this from BB2, and all three to what I know is happening…
January 11, 2009 at 10:23 pm
i don’t really get much information about this online goof- most of it is just talking to folks who tell me stuff. but the back economy (contractors, freelance and sole proprietors) is not covered by typical government statistics and it is huge. i know a lot of those people because for most of my life i was a subcontractor. it is great being your own boss but you have to be tough to survive without the umbilical cord of a traditional job even in the best of times. the problem is that contract labor is the first to feel a depression, and i am seeing a lot of them seeking assistance for the first time in their lives. that is scary.
it is not much fun being right about something like this, but i felt this train coming many months ago. the silence out there from business owners is not reassuring either. no one is saying i am being too pessimistic.