Darkness on the Edge of Town.

The longer I'm in business, the more I believe that if you just hang in there long enough, you'll come back in style.

There is what I call retail fadism. The following history is loose, and there was a lot of crossover, but you get the picture.

Huge, block-filling department stores came in around the turn of the century, putting all the little stores around them out of business.

Montgomery Ward and Sears innovated the catalog business, and then, when it came time to build stores, looked for cheap land on the edge of town.

As the decades passed, the outskirts became the inskirts, and along came the suburban malls.

Enclosed malls are all the rage, (again, being built on the cheap edges of towns) and Sears and J.C. Penny were quick to move there. Specialty niche stores, like the Gap, came in to fill the smaller spaces.

Then came the big discounters-- Walmart, Target, and huge category killers, Best Buy and Barnes and Nobles. Built on the edge of town. (getting the picture?)

Bigger and bigger, and a new term for developments, Big Box stores, Big Box Centers. With ironically homespun names like "The Village."

Enclosed malls fall out of favor. Some malls started facing outward, and called them "factory outlet" malls. But they quickly sold all the factory outlet material and just became....malls.

Meanwhile, some of the department stores survive and after many years their diversity starts to help them.

The big category killers and the little specialty niche stores start to have trouble, because the Big Box stores are even better at discounting than they are.

And along comes the ultimate "Edge of Town." The internet.

And so it goes.

The little mom and pop stores? Sorry, they don't even count. We are the fleas, persistent and itchy.