Recently I have been observing lots of retail stores are either closing/closed or being sold. All the stores in my nearest shopping center has been swapped recently. Even one of my local independent grocery store is put on sale even with good ongoing footfall.
What's going on? Is this sign of dire economy situation?
How is the situation in your area? Is the business being eaten up by recent online boom and offline businesses are struggling?
Up? It's down like 24% from January.
Still up if you have diamond hands
Not any better for online stores, a totally unfair playing field for small businesses. Suppliers and distributors offer bigger discounts to large companies, and shipping carriers provide them with better rates.
100% agree, were in this akward state where brick and morter is dying, but instead of busineses saving rent money moving online That rent money its now just going to online retailers like amazon, ebay etc, who keep just hiking up prices and have fees on every single transaction… This can easily work out being probably more expensive that brick and mortar. I reckon this is why theres not as many good deals at xmas and boxing day
My personal view is Australia were quite behind other countries in online shopping pre-Covid (at least comparing to UK). With the lockdowns, people got more comfortable ordering online and getting everything delivered. Stores adapted to this too and widened their offerings. From there on, it's difficult to go back to retail store shopping when you can have most things same/next day delivered for cheaper. There's also the introduction of direct-from-China marketplaces that will have taken a huge chunk out of local retail sales.
Remember around 12 years ago or so when stores like Myer only allowed online sales during business hours? Australia has always been behind.
There's also the introduction of direct-from-China marketplaces that will have taken a huge chunk out of local retail sales.
They have always existed and there are significantly less stores now than the golden years of cheap stuff from China (~2011-2014). The difference now is that instead of waiting 4-8 weeks you can get stuff delivered within 1-2 weeks for free.
Did you shop at any of those stores?
Yes, my wife used to buy from our local NoniB store and I used to goto local fruit and veggies store which is closed now :(
Wouldn't call NoniB independent…
NoniB is linked with Rivers which closed down 2 days ago.
Just knowing that your wife shops at NoniB tells me a lot about your demographic. Soon you will be moving to Millers Fashion Club (or is it just Millers now?)
nonib lol
Our economy is literally riding on the NDIS's money printing back - we should be heavily in a recession right now.
If you're in private you're getting fcuked hard.
NDIS is such a rort, they should scale it back.
Libs changed how it was subsedised, It used to be like bulk billing where there were rules around what can be covered, for what service and what price range, or it wouldnt be subsedised at all..
Liberals changed it to be a fixed amount and so of course every NDIS provider just upped their prices include the max rebate amount possible, + what ever they were already charging.
The providers certainly do overcharge. Then there's the cost of the occupational therapist who has to write up the report to access funding for the overpriced item/service. Often it's people who could easily just go out and pay for it themselves but want it for free from the government.
So what happens with all the people who genuinely need those supports but aren't, in the eyes of the government, "disabled enough" for dsp?
There plenty who need support that don't get whilst there's able bodied people getting mobility scooters because they're too lazy to walk to the shops.
@JIMB0: Doesn't justify cutting it to those who need it. It's actually very hard to get NDIS funding right now.
@JIMB0: Perhaps educate yourself on what it actually takes to get onto the NDIS. I’m so sick of people like you spouting this uneducated bs.
@JIMB0: Can you link to ay source or evidence for the claim that people are getting mobility scooters because they're too lazy to walk to the shops? I know of just one person with a mobility scooter in my extended social circle, who can only stand very briefly and has been in a wheelchair for something like 15 years.
no thank you.. my disabled daughter relies on it. she's already had much needed funding cut.
NDIS is such a sensitive topic. Everyone knows you have to control the cost but given one single legitimate case is mistreated, your political life is over. It will be all over the news and your oppositions will attack you fiercely.
The genie is out of the bottle, it's hard to control him. Whoever design this scheme (Bill Shorten) is irresponsible. Now noone wants to clean this mess.
This is all the flow on of rampant inflation and technical recession.
Locally, hospitality and building industry are both being hit hard with high numbers of insolvency. Have to remember though that small businesses dont have to lodge with ASIC so it's harder to track.
Everything seems fine to the government employees that I have business or personal contact with. Hence, OP must be misguided.
All the stores in my nearest shopping center
Westfield Hornsby?
It's not Westfield a local shopping center in western
Then list them one by one please Ash?
local independent
Well sure there’s always a feel good aspect to supporting local, but how much markup are you prepared to cough up?
Unless they are like a franchised IGA or sunlit (Chinese mini marts) etc - buying power going to be limited , not to mention being hit with associated fees in upkeeping and fit outs, while still having all the normal type of business costs like wages.
Local stores are pricy but at least it existed as a local convenient store. Even that model seems to be dead now
20th century business models don't really work in 2025. Colesworth are around just from sheer monopoly. You can expect a lot of shops that follow more modern business models from overseas popping up soon, Asian chains and such.
Unmanned shops ?
that worked well for amazon
Duopoly.
What outdated business models and 'modern business models' are you referring to?
The whole management and service structures, the expensive executives who relied on no competition in the shops to pay their salaries making the companies top heavy, sticking with the same old supply chains they were using 25+ years ago, all of it. The world has changed a lot since these popular chains started up many decades ago.
But if you get rid of middle and upper management who's going to create the synergies and keep everyone in the loop?
"Why aren't people buying from this store"
Next minute: So anyway I ordered 20 things on Amazon
At least 500 people payed $400 a head for Christmas Day lunch on the Gold Coast 2024.
That's just one restaurant.
What financial crisis?
I found a dollar while spending 5 seconds looking for the remote.
"Man earns $3,600 an hour while sitting on the couch, click here to find out how!"
Counterpoint: This is exactly the opportunity to tell Muppet Detector to put his family's life savings into running a restaurant given how business savvy he clearly is.
"Why eat at Hungry Jacks when we could give Dunning Krugers a go"
At least 500 people payed $400 a head for Christmas Day lunch on the Gold Coast 2024.
They were all CFMEU 'Stop Sign holders' on their 12 week Xmas leave entitlement…
Your state? And what stores?
Don't believe your lying eyes, everything is fine, look => interest rate cut, please vote for us …
Wait till we have 10% off rare $900 lego it will be sold out in 15mins
Amazon had a few sets on decent sales today.
Picked up Bowser $100 off, D&D red dragon $80 off and LOTR black one $100 off.
About 10 others on sale too.
Popular dish in india.
60% of small businesses fail in the first 3 years. You are just noticing it in the same way you notice other red Camrys when you buy one - you have noticed a few of the stores you go to have closed, then look around and see that other stores have closed. But that has always been going on, you just havent been paying attention.
Of course it goes in cycles; high inflation and people cut discretionary spend which is retail and hospitality which are visible.
How is the situation in your area? Is the business being eaten up by recent online boom and offline businesses are struggling?
You see it here all the time, people will do anything to save 33 cents on an item.
I keep saying, if you reward office works/JBHI with a sale via a price match to a cheaper store, all the cheap stores will close up shop from no sales so you'll have no one to price match to!
Factor in that not every small/independent business is guaranteed to survive AND the rent demands of greedy landlords.
No more empty shops than usual in my area. Perhaps youre just starting to notice?
More and more of people's money getting chewed up my rent / mortgage payments, electricity bills etc means less money to spend on literally everything else. The cost of housing, in particular, is distorting our economy in very unnatural and unsustainable ways.
"managed decline", it's the current thing.
'sign of dire economy situation' pretty much hits it ….
remember there will be thousands of ex-employees out there scrambling for livelihood now ..
Costs has increased, wages are too high with all the obligations, margin reduced significantly, people are not spending, businesses are doing it tough to survive.
It's not cheap to run an independent store…
Labor is expensive, unless you can have cheap labor, you're competing with like Coles who can probably offer more per hour than you can.
Utilities have gone up, keeping lights on aren't cheap even.
Insurances have gone up, little foot traffic won't pay for the insurance
Buying goods at high costs, only to make a tiny margin is hard, again depending on what kind of store it is, Coles, Kmart, etc will just beat you to pricing.
I think it is kind of depressing, people are on their phones, computers etc, enough as it is. Sure consumerism isn't a solution to that, but at least going out of your house, walking around having a look at a variety of stores would be nice.
The only ones I see that close down then another new one comes back up are like smaller eateries.
Truth be told, the stores and businesses that are closing/have closed were already teetering pre-pandemic. It's corporate, natural selection, if you don't adapt, you die. Plus there's many layers that have impacted as well. Consumer attitudes changing, reliance on e-commerce, cost of living, etc
Thank you Albo.
Add wealth gap. Houses/corporate profit continue to be record breaking. Salary stagnant.
Yes there is a noticeable amount of vacant shopfronts/offices vacant.
I think there are many factors.
1) Property prices are up, rent is up (ROI for the overlord landlord), so less profit for the store owner. Where i work in the Sydney CBD, the owner of the coffee shop down stairs mentioned his rent increased from 12K per week to over 20K.
2) People go in-store, physically see the product, then buy from a cheaper online retailer without the overheads - the store does all the work, but gets no reward.
3) To run any business, the time/effort/risk should be beneficial. If I can earn $100k p.a in a 9-5 with no 'real' stress.. I would expect at least 150-200k p.a. to even consider all the additional burden of a business.. When profit slips, I would shut-up-shop and get a 9-5.
4) The global economy is here.. places like aliexpress are killing local products with the speed they can get things delivered now days. I was buying from ebay where the product was within our borders, now i buying a lot more from aliexpress as I am ok to wait an extra week to get it half the price.
5) There is some level of cutting back on spending… there is a cost-of-living crisis.
Something has to give sooner or later… and there will be pain either way
We're in a massive per capita GDP and productivity recession. This is worse than a normal recession in since the government is "printing" massive amounts of money which causes inflation. It's a double whammy. Economically Bad/corrupt government is the biggest issue. Both sides are bad, Liberals just sightly less so. We don't really have a functioning democracy right now, look up the uniparty.
Clarification: They are printing money to ensure that GDP stays positive so there's no massive headlines about Australia being in recession. This is bad for everyone except big business and pollies.
Our politicians and government says the CPI and inflation is only 3.8%, business is great and unemployment is low.
Immigration is at an all time high.
The economy is going really well at the moment
Just like the cash rate
Having Socialist governments at all levels certainly doesn't help…
it would if it was extremely left without the corruption
everyone would get the same but that would never happen
Hopefully this is just a transitional period where more service or experiences related stores will replace retail stores.
People can blame whatever things they want, and whichever government or politicians - at the end of the day it's all bullsh*#! This whole situation is caused primarily by a single factor. We live in an artificially constructed bubble of high rents in the commercial and residential sectors. Land, building, house prices are all sky high and out of touch. The capitalist greed has gone so far it's now making most business for the 50%+ of small guys/girls doing business marginal, to having employment elsewhere for someone else.
artificially constructed bubble, how true it is!
Which is purposeful to push all businesses to use AI and robotics more and more which in turn is leaving more and more humans permanently redundant which fuels dependency on daddy government and provides justification for fascism (public private partnerships, social impact bonds, etc) and eugenics (involuntary sterilization, involuntary medical assistance in dying) and expansion of the police state (with more orwellian surveillance, ubiquitous CCTV with facial and number plate recognition, phasing out cash, forcing biometric verification for financial transactions or bank access, etc).
It's a worldwide problem, not only in AU. Those economic leaders like US, China, etc now have similar problem. Offline biz collapse makes many street dead. Some shopping malls become ghost hubs. Search youtube, you can watch many report on this problem.
People have migrated to online shopping. I’m happy to buy online but I really prefer to buy from bricks and mortar stores if the price is not too much higher. I do think with the increased density of apartments in some areas you will see an increase in local shops. A lot of the apartment buildings near us have a coffee shop at the ground floor level. It will be interesting to see how this balances out in the long term.
just what we need more coffee shops in Melbourne
It is just as valid as any other business.
A large number of businesses closed down in my area during the 2020-2021 silliness. Now many of those empty shopfronts are being turned into various Indian marts.
Besides groceries, i would say 80% of my shopping is done online now. I havent been to the local major shopping center in months, just no need to.
Happen in my local shopping mall as well (not Westfield), all are gone ( a clothing store, a shoe store, a carpet store ? ). Ironically, they are replaced with more grocery stores.
I don't shop independence though. I go to Kmart/BigW/Uniloq/Bunnings/groceries for all my needs.
Food court is also doing ok. I don't see any of them go away.
The rent that these shopping centres charge is insanely high. It is very hard to stay afloat
It's always the same story. More people are buying online, rent and utilities are going up.