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points by bobthepanda 3 days ago | 0 comments
They sell fairly space-efficient, expensive products or services. Generally speaking, the higher you push rent per square foot, the fewer types of businesses you can operate, because people and products take up space and have throughput limits. Nail and beauty services can get spendy fast.

The US has something similar going on with medical and dental offices for the same reasons.

[–] estearum 2 days ago
The other US phenomenon is mega-chains which can operate at much narrower margins (or even negative margins in some marquee locations).
[–] bobthepanda 2 days ago
To be fair, that specifically is not a US phenomena. Flagship stores that operate as a loss purely for the prestige of a location have existed basically since the dawn of modern retail. Operating in Manhattan or on the Champs Elysees is a sign you are a serious grownup store.
[–] estearum 2 days ago
The flagship stores yes, but that was the special case (which is universal) of the more US-specific case of e.g. "why the fuck are there Chipotles everywhere"
[–] bobthepanda 20 hours ago
Oh i see. Yeah, the corporate structure of “landowners with a business attached” is somewhat uniquely dominant in America. Though not totally unheard of, Japanese rail companies are property developers for example with attached department store chains, etc. so that trains and property drive foot traffic to each other.