Canadian Retail Thread

[Wigs]

Originally Posted by softee

North Bay had a Kresge's, A Woolworth's, a Simpson-Sears and an Eaton's on Main Street in the glory days of downtown shopping.

softee, based on fairly recent walkabouts of yours, your hometown is a shell of its former self. a damn shame!
I hope all Northern Ontario cities can finally hit their stride in the 2020s. Not sure which is the best overall.

[MonctonRad]

Charlottetown was much the same. The downtown department stores included Eaton's, Zellers, Holmans (an island department store), Metropolitan, Woolworths, Moore & McLeod (another island department store) and, I have fuzzy recollections of a Simpson Sears (it burnt down).

Downtown shopping was the way to go!

[Proof Sheet]

Originally Posted by softee

North Bay had a Kresge's, A Woolworth's, a Simpson-Sears and an Eaton's on Main Street in the glory days of downtown shopping.

Anymore classic postcards in your collection. I love those kind of postcards.

[casper]

Not a post-card but this is what Victoria and Vancouver "main street" looked like 115 years ago.

Real video that has been colourised. Take from a street car.

• Video Link

[Denscity]

That streetcar is awesome

[Denscity]

Trail BC next door had a Bay, formerly Eatons, Kresge's, and a Woolworth then Woolco then Zellers. We were just a village back then.
Then in the 80s got a McDonalds and 7eleven. So that was our Friday night head to Trail for 7eleven, McDonalds, then hit the mall till 9pm.

[urbandreamer]

Trail feels like it was supposed to be a bigger city. I hope someday we return to building towns like our ancestors did before WW2.

[cslusarc]

Reuters reports that Bed Bath & Beyond to wind down Canada operations.

[Loco101]

Originally Posted by cslusarc

Reuters reports that Bed Bath & Beyond to wind down Canada operations.

Not a surprise at all. The company has been in trouble for awhile. All of the U.S. locations will likely close as well. The prices at that store are very high and Amazon has been the reason that they have lost a lot of customers. I like the store for looking at things.

[Loco101]

Originally Posted by esquire

I've never been to North Bay so I have no frame of reference, but it looks like a pretty big city in that vintage postcard.

It has a population of about 52,000 today. Its population has changed much at all over the last few decades. It's a nice city in my opinion and I lived there for a year. I always enjoyed Lake Nipissing and the sunsets over it.

[srperrycgy]

Originally Posted by cslusarc

Reuters reports that Bed Bath & Beyond to wind down Canada operations.

Visited their store at CrossIron Mills north of Calgary a few weeks ago. Their inventory was a lot less than a few months before and it was obvious that a closure was imminent. It was a good place to browse and see all the kitchen and home gadgets. Sad that its closing, but expected.

[Loco101]

Originally Posted by srperrycgy

Visited their store at CrossIron Mills north of Calgary a few weeks ago. Their inventory was a lot less than a few months before and it was obvious that a closure was imminent. It was a good place to browse and see all the kitchen and home gadgets. Sad that its closing, but expected.

I had similar observations when I was at the store in Sudbury. That store opened in the Spring of 2020 which of course was a rough time and I could just tell that the location wouldn't last as it had very few customers even on weekends. I've always like BB&B stores but more recently their prices have been way too high for most of their items in my opinion.

[Djeffery]

I liked them as I could always find gadgety type thing to get my wife for Christmas. I got out first Instant Pot there, some other kitchen stuff, games, some stuff you just buy on the spur of the moment. I always had the same experience at the old Linens And Things. And just like them I'm not surprised BB&B is going away.

[Loco101]

Another chain store that opened in Sudbury during the pandemic was Linen Chest. It is located in the New Sudbury Centre shopping mall. It is similar to BB&B but is much smaller. The Sudbury location doesn't look as though it's doing well from my observations. Linen Chest is based out of Quebec.

[Denscity]

Originally Posted by urbandreamer

Trail feels like it was supposed to be a bigger city. I hope someday we return to building towns like our ancestors did before WW2.

It was a bigger city in the 60s and 70s. So was Nelson actually.
The main employer Teck Cominco used to employ 11000. Now it employs 1100.

[Djeffery]

Originally Posted by Loco101

Another chain store that opened in Sudbury during the pandemic was Linen Chest. It is located in the New Sudbury Centre shopping mall. It is similar to BB&B but is much smaller. The Sudbury location doesn't look as though it's doing well from my observations. Linen Chest is based out of Quebec.

We have one in the same commercial area where BB&B is, but I've never been in it. Might have to check it out sometime.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by Loco101

Another chain store that opened in Sudbury during the pandemic was Linen Chest. It is located in the New Sudbury Centre shopping mall. It is similar to BB&B but is much smaller. The Sudbury location doesn't look as though it's doing well from my observations. Linen Chest is based out of Quebec.

Linen Chest in Moncton seems to be doing OK.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by cslusarc

Reuters reports that Bed Bath & Beyond to wind down Canada operations.

That’s too bad. I liked browsing through there and it takes 400 full time jobs plus many part time jobs with it.

[urbandreamer]

I was in my local bank branch for a few hours recently and my oh my was it dead! Am I thinking what every bank CEO is thinking? Chop chop.

[SpongeG]

the BB&B store sizes were on the bigger side, which will leave a lot of large spaces to fill. Are there any big box stores needing space around Canada? Locally I could see some becoming something like Marshalls or Winners. Most of the stores are too big for Dollarama.