The Big Box Capital Of Canada!

[Proof Sheet]

Originally Posted by ssiguy

The entire Fraser Valley is nothing more than a series of big box stores connected by lousy roads. Outside of White Rock, Cloverdale, and downtown Langley, the entire FV thru to Abbotsford is nothing but a collection of malls, strip plazas and big box power centres. Outside of those small exceptions, it's basically just Scarborough urban blight spread over an areas 5X bigger.

Drive from the east edge of Oshawa westbound through Oshawa,Whitby, Ajax,Pickering and then through Scarb and leave Toronto via Mississauga,Oakville, Burlington,over the Burlington Skyway, Stoney Creek and then on to Grimsby and believe all you see are greige coloured vinyl siding snout houses, warehouses, big box barf. self storage complexes, strip malls, gas stations and malls.

Speaking of malls, seeing the Amish Furniture place next to the 'Arent' we naughty' in Pickering is one of the few highlights.

[Blutowski]

[MonctonRad]

That's a lot of Costco's! I had heard that Costco looks for a base population of about 250,000 before establishing a new store, which makes sense because NB has three Costco stores for 780,000 people.

Given Edmonton's population, I could see five, possibly six Costco stores but eight?? Edmontonians must be big into shopping for the apocalypse........

[goodgrowth]

There are lots of cities well below 250,000 that have a Costco. (ie Medicine Hat, Courtenay, Fredericton, Kamloops...etc)

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by goodgrowth

There are lots of cities well below 250,000 that have a Costco. (ie Medicine Hat, Courtenay, Fredericton, Kamloops...etc)

I know, but Costco stores tend to draw from a large regional base, and they tend to look at regional population statistics. Based on purely urban populations, NB shouldn't have any Costco stores, but regionally it makes sense. The Moncton store serves northern & eastern NB, Cumberland County NS and PEI. The Saint John store services southern NB from Sussex to the US border. The Fredericton store services the capital region and western NB.

PEI is deemed too small because the provincial population is less than 160,000 (although I think Costco would do well there). Cape Breton is similar. Since both PEI and CB are islands however, they are deemed to have no hinterlands, therefore Costco does no factor regional populations into their equations.

[goodgrowth]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

I know, but Costco stores tend to draw from a large regional base, and they tend to look at regional population statistics. Based on purely urban populations, NB shouldn't have any Costco stores, but regionally it makes sense. The Moncton store serves northern & eastern NB, Cumberland County NS and PEI. The Saint John store services southern NB from Sussex to the US border. The Fredericton store services the capital region and western NB.

PEI is deemed too small because the provincial population is less than 160,000 (although I think Costco would do well there). Cape Breton is similar. Since both PEI and CB are islands however, they are deemed to have no hinterlands, there Costco does no factor regional populations into their equations.

Right but I'm not sure some of those cities I listed have close to a regional base of 250,000. It seems to me that it could be more like 150,000-200,000 regional base as the starting limit. Also a city like Saskatoon has 2 with a population of 330,000.

Given Edmonton's CMA population 8 does seem possible.

I think I'm not going out on a limb to say that Costco is pretty popular in Canada.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by goodgrowth

I think I'm not going out on a limb to say that Costco is pretty popular in Canada.

I don't go to Costco without my elbow protectors and shin guards. The usual decorum of shoppers goes out the window when fighting over the last prepackaged Chicken Penne Alfredo meal in the display case!!!

[FrAnKs]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

That's a lot of Costco's! I had heard that Costco looks for a base population of about 250,000 before establishing a new store, which makes sense because NB has three Costco stores for 780,000 people.

Given Edmonton's population, I could see five, possibly six Costco stores but eight?? Edmontonians must be big into shopping for the apocalypse........

Yes it's alot! We only have 3 in the greater Quebec city area and we are 830k...

[CityTech]

Originally Posted by le calmar

So 8 Costcos in Edmonton? That’s a lot. I noticed they usually don’t go above a ratio of one Costco per 275-300k people. Calgary and Ottawa-Gatineau have 5 each. I imagine the demand in Edmonton is exceptional.

In Ottawa-Gatineau if you look at where the 4 costcos are, there are 2 inside the Greenbelt and 2 outside the Greenbelt. The 2 inside the Greenbelt are at opposite ends of that area (one in the SW, one in the NE), but the 2 outside the Greenbelt are both in the western part of the urban area. So the western half of the city has a lot more Costcos per capita than the eastern half.

There's a certain type of person who shops at Costco a lot, and in Ottawa they're a lot more likely to live in the western part of the city. Perhaps Edmonton vs Calgary has a similar dynamic.

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by le calmar

So 8 Costcos in Edmonton? That’s a lot. I noticed they usually don’t go above a ratio of one Costco per 275-300k people. Calgary and Ottawa-Gatineau have 5 each. I imagine the demand in Edmonton is exceptional.

yeah. London only has two Costcos (we badly need a third), for a metro of about 530,000.

[MolsonExport]

Costco is betting long on Edmonton. Wooty woot!

[Djeffery]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

yeah. London only has two Costcos (we badly need a third), for a metro of about 530,000.

When they build the new one in the south end, they could probably leave the old one open and them both still be insane.

[Innsertnamehere]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

That's a lot of Costco's! I had heard that Costco looks for a base population of about 250,000 before establishing a new store, which makes sense because NB has three Costco stores for 780,000 people.

Given Edmonton's population, I could see five, possibly six Costco stores but eight?? Edmontonians must be big into shopping for the apocalypse........

I wouldn’t take that as a solid rule at all. Orillia has one in Ontario with only 50,000 people. I think that one works though as it’s the closest Costco to cottage country which has an absolutely massive summer population.

Hamilton has 2 meanwhile with nearly 600,000 people, and one of them only opened a couple years ago. There is another one in Burlington as well which is actually closer than the two in Hamilton for a lot of locations in the city though. So I guess 3 Costco’s for a metro area of 800,000.

[Slide]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

That's a lot of Costco's! I had heard that Costco looks for a base population of about 250,000 before establishing a new store, which makes sense because NB has three Costco stores for 780,000 people.

Given Edmonton's population, I could see five, possibly six Costco stores but eight?? Edmontonians must be big into shopping for the apocalypse........

Just to clarify, #8 on the map is apparently a "Costco Wholesale Business Centre" - not a regular Costco. So for regular shopping the Edmonton area will still have 7, not 8.

(and to further clarify, only 4 of those are in Edmonton proper. #7 on the map is St. Albert's Costco, #6 is Sherwood Park's Costco, and #5 is Leduc's Costco.

Still a lot of Costcos in the area, but hopefully that makes more sense re: the high number.
Edmonton at 990,000 @ 4 costcos = ~250,000 per costco; which sounds to be the number everyone has been mentioning above.

[TheGreatestX]

https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/c...age-asset.jpeg

Edmonton is king of box stores

[ssiguy]

Funny we're mentioning Costco because I never really considered it big box just as I have never considered large grocery stores as being such. I guess it all depends on your definition. If they are big box then I guess we could say that there were Canada's first big box developments because they have been around since the end of WW2.

[zahav]

Speaking of Edmonton, I posted this on the Canada Retail Thread, but it ties in a bit here since it shows the further de-centralization of retail there, where malls and power centres continue to edge in. I'd say Edmonton losing Holts and The Bay are two of the best examples of downtown retail decline seen anywhere in Canada

The Bay is closing their downtown Edmonton location. Symbolically it is sad since The Bay is kind of a hallmark of Canada's downtowns, and is a huge part of Canada's retail history. The article even mentions how Edmonton will be the only major city in Canada without a department store (Holt Renfrew closed earlier this year). I'm sure this is disappointing to a lot of people, again symbolically, since I'm sure a lot of forumers here wouldn't have shopped there necessarily. The article is a good read though

https://www.retail-insider.com/retai...fter-207-years

[Blutowski]

Originally Posted by Slide

Just to clarify, #8 on the map is apparently a "Costco Wholesale Business Centre" - not a regular Costco. So for regular shopping the Edmonton area will still have 7, not 8.

(and to further clarify, only 4 of those are in Edmonton proper. #7 on the map is St. Albert's Costco, #6 is Sherwood Park's Costco, and #5 is Leduc's Costco.

Still a lot of Costcos in the area, but hopefully that makes more sense re: the high number.
Edmonton at 990,000 @ 4 costcos = ~250,000 per costco; which sounds to be the number everyone has been mentioning above.

Sherwood Park population 70 000, St Albert 65 000 and Leduc near the airport is 30 000. Each of these places has a Costco but nowhere near the threshold of 250 000. I think the Edmonton area has an abundance of Costcos, and big box in general due to fairly high income levels, and a regional market that includes central and northern Alberta.

[Corndogger]

Originally Posted by ssiguy

Funny we're mentioning Costco because I never really considered it big box just as I have never considered large grocery stores as being such. I guess it all depends on your definition. If they are big box then I guess we could say that there were Canada's first big box developments because they have been around since the end of WW2.

Are you saying that Costco's been around since the end of WWII?

[ssiguy]

Originally Posted by Corndogger

Are you saying that Costco's been around since the end of WWII?

No but rather that grocery {like Costco} stores have been.