Welcome to The Hoosier Illuminati. Macintosh bigot, clothes horse, motorsports fanatic (as long as they turn right), Anglophile.

Clothes and manners do not make the man; but when he is made, they greatly improve his appearance. --Henry Ward Beecher

Marsh is closing stores

Including one in my stomping grounds that has fallen prey to a new Wal-Mart just down the street.

Cue the usual wailing and gnashing of teeth about how Wal-Mart is responsible for Marsh going down the toilet and how Wal-Mart destroys communities.  Well, spare me, because it simply isn’t true.  The Winchester Marsh store sucked long before Wal-Mart moved in, Wal-Mart presented shoppers with an alternative, and THAT is why Marsh closed.  It really is that simple. 

Look, if you can’t, don’t or won’t compete on price, you have to compete on something else.  In the case of Marsh, that has to be service and product.  When Marsh had a decent fresh meat case I shopped there several times a week on my way home.  Or I tried to anyway, be sure to get there before 6:30 or so because if you don’t the fresh meat case will be closed.  If you did get there before 6:30, the case might be open, but good luck getting anyone to wait on you.  And, as I said, that was WHEN Marsh had a fresh meat case, they took it out about a month ago.  I can get pre-packaged crap at either store, but less expensively at Wal-Mart.  The occasionally futile attempt to purchase decent meat was the sole reason I ever went to Marsh, but I bought quite a bit while I was there.  Now I don’t. 

With a few major exceptions I found the Marsh staff unpleasant and unresponsive.  Their prices on the things I bought were always about 25% higher than the competition.  These things were true before Wal-Mart ever built a grocery in the town I’m talking about. Then Marsh voluntarily removed the one product line that I couldn’t buy at Wal-Mart. 

I don’t like Wal-Mart.  At all.  But here are the options:  Both stores are unpleasant.  Neither store has much in the way of friendly, personal service.  Now both stores have the same merchandise, Marsh having voluntarily crippled itself.  One store forces its employees to wear silly sailor hats, the other forces its employees to wear silly vests.  One store is significantly cheaper.  Where do you go?  There’s no reason NOT to accept the less expensive alternative, as much as I’d like to.  That, my friends, is why Marsh is in the shape it’s in.  Wal-Mart didn’t make Marsh hire unpleasant people (and damn few of them at any one time).  Wal-Mart didn’t make Marsh remove their superior products.  Wal-Mart didn’t make Marsh cause me to stand at the meat counter for ten minutes waiting for someone to notice me.  Marsh did that all on their own. 

Me, now I go Krogering whenever possible and patronize the local independent meat market.  They’re a little (but not much) out of my way.  But I won’t go to Marsh anymore.  They let me know a long time before they locked the doors that they didn’t care about my business.