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Originally Posted by esquire
It's interesting how resistant the Canadian marketplace generally is to those types of 'in between' sized grocers... the ones that, like Carrefour City, are maybe double the size of a 7-Eleven but still manage to offer pretty well a full range of groceries. I suppose there must be some reason for it, but you would think there would be some room between tiny convenience stores and conventional full sized supermarkets.
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The Vancouver area has a lot of these kinds of stores. IGA is a small-format, urban, full-service grocery store. They're often in the base of midrise condos with about 30 parking spots in the basement. Then there's Urban Fare, and for non-groceries, there's London Drugs which sells everything from home electronics to cookware. It's like a mini-Wal Mart, and they're very urban focused. Also, Vancouver is just good at slotting mid and large-sized retail into condo podiums. You can see No Frills, Whole Foods, Save On, Canadian Tire and even Costco at the base of condo towers with a street entrance for customers on foot.
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As for Starbucks, it does seem that their star is fading. The only people I know who get excited for it are those in their 40s who came of age in the 90s when Starbucks had some real brand cachet. To younger people, I get the impression that Starbucks is basically like McDonald's to them... a familiar place you can go to in a pinch.
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Yeah. They had a bit of a boost in the last few years with their Pumpkin Spice Latte offering, which appealed to a lot of *ahem* basic girls, but they lost out on the PSL season because of the pandemic.
Also, nobody goes out of their way to go to a Starbucks - it's usually something you do between appointments - and this year nobody was traveling between appointments.
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