During the height of the COVID panic, governments across America irrationally announced that mom-and-pop and other small, community stores, all with minimal foot traffic, must close while the big retailers, which always had hundreds or thousands coming through the store every day, should now cater to even more people. Unsurprisingly, the big retailers were completely on board with this plan, just as they were slaves to BLM and its “defund the police” mantra. These retail outlets were amazingly shortsighted. They’re now reaping the bitter harvest of COVID closures and BLM madness along with the rest of us.
I don’t need to rehash the history with you. You remember the edicts across America that only America’s largest retailers could be open to customers during the manufactured COVID panic. Suddenly, we were all being funneled into those same stores, whether we wanted to shop there or not—and whether or not we felt we were safer in a small store with a handful of people than in a large store with thousands of people.
The inevitable happened, of course, which was that small retailers went out of business in unprecedented numbers. In May 2021, as the Biden administration was prolonging the plandemic, even the plandemic- and lockdown-friendly World Economic Forum noted just how dire the numbers were. In just one year, 34% of small businesses nationwide had closed, with hard-left San Francisco seeing 48% of its small businesses close. The Wall Street Journal said there were 200,000 extra closures in the plandemic’s first year.
Image: Walmart store by Walmart Corporate. CC BY 2.0.
Meanwhile, big retailers’ profits boomed, with stores also embracing the e-commerce model that Amazon pioneered. What more could the big retailers desire?
After all, who would not want less competition from small retailers and a government that funneled business their way? That government, of course, was Democrat-run. Republican governors (i.e., Florida’s Ron DeSantis, South Carolina’s Henry MacMaster, or South Dakota’s Kirti Noem), after a brief flirtation with panic, went back to the “business as usual” model.
The big retailers also fell all over themselves supporting 2020’s BLM riots, never mind that BLM (a) was trashing and robbing the big stores and (b) was demanding less law enforcement, which made all future trashing and robbing much easier.
Now we’re seeing the truth to the expression that “you should be careful what you ask for because you might get it.” Thanks to the same policies from which the big retailers benefitted, America’s economy has gone into freefall, and retail crime is out of control. Both these factors are striking the big retailers, with Walmart being the latest to fall prey to the economic fallout from the short-term policies that initially served it so well:
Walmart announced they’re shuttering 12 stores across nine states and Washington DC this year due to failing profits - on the same day they announced hundreds of layoffs at fulfilment centers.
The big box chain has been closing a handful of stores annually in recent years, always citing the location ‘underperforming.’
The retail behemoth is also closing two stores in Illinois and Arkansas that were ‘pick-up only.’
The main locations ending their run are in Washington DC, Florida, Illinois, Hawaii, Indiana, Minnesota, New Mexico, Oregon, Washington State and Wisconsin.
It comes the same day the company announced hundreds of workers at five facilities that fulfill e-commerce orders are being asked to find jobs within 90 days at other company locations.
Walmart is not alone. Business Insider wrote three days ago that “more than a dozen major retailers have said they will close at least 1,412 US stores in 2023.” The list is impressive in a depressing way:
- Foot Locker closing 545 stores
- Bed Bath & Beyond closing 416 stores
- Tuesday Morning closing 265 stores
- Bath & Body Works closing 50 stores
- Gap and Banana Republic closing 46 stores
- Party City closing 22 stores
- Best Buy closing 20 stores
- Walmart closing 17 stores
- Amazon closing at least 8 stores
- Big Lots closing 7 stores
- Macy’s closing 4 stores
- Target closing 4 stores
It would be easy to gloat about sowing the wind and reaping the whirlwind, but the fact is that every store and warehouse closure means ordinary Americans have lost a job. The downward spiral that started with—and the big stores thought would be limited to—small retailers is gradually eating away at the entire retail sector in America.
That’s the problem, of course, when anything gets too big. It has too much power to bend reality to its will and, when reality finally snaps back, that same big entity takes everything else down with it.
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/hundreds-funds-brink-losing-esg-ratings
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/how-they-convinced-trump-lock-down
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2023/03/military_recruitment_under_joe_biden_reaches_bleakest_levels_since_postvietnam_nadir.html
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2023/03/is_woke_marxism_made_in_china.html
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2023/03/did_woke_banking_trigger_americas_banking_crisis_.html
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