Negative impact?

Residents feel having three Wal-Marts in the city will have a negative impact on local businesses, a new study suggests.

Thunder Bay Ventures along with students from Lakehead University released their findings on a study looking at the potential economic impacts Wal-Mart’s expansion will have. The study surveyed 308 residents, less than one per cent of the population, for their opinions as well as 22 local businesses.

Of those surveyed, 75 per cent believed the city didn’t need additional stores and that multiple Wal-Marts will have a negative impact on local businesses.

The similar results were found when surveying local businesses. About 50 per cent of businesses claim that the major retail store is affecting their business and of those who responded 73 per cent believed it impacted them negatively.

Royden Potvin, manager of Ventures, said there’s a general feeling of negativity when it comes to Wal-Mart expanding but there is evidence that the stores do have a lot of foot traffic. He said there is support for the store because people shop there but at the same time, there’s some negative sentiments.

He said that there will be less shopping options for people in the long term once the city has its three Wal-Marts.

“I’m concerned about other small retailers in this city,” Potvin said. “The retailing business is changing. If micro and smaller retailers can’t respond in an appropriate manner they are going to get left behind. (The study) is probably not statistically as accurate as we would have liked. We didn’t have a lot of time nor funds to do a broader survey. We feel it is a good proxy though for the community’s sentiment.”

He added that they didn’t look at the impacts the decrease in the city’s tourism or the change in the economy would have on shopping but did take into consideration the number of jobs lost because of large retail stores like Wal-Mart.

Harold Wilson, president of the Thunder Bay Chamber of Commerce, called the study basic because of the financial and time restraints put on the students but overall provided good information.

“We’re aware that small businesses are challenged all the time,” Wilson said. “It’s important that they do whatever they can to do whatever they can to get ahead. One thing I did like about the study was one of the graphs that showed how people make the decision to shop whether it’s price, service and quality. Small businesses may not be able to beat on price but there’s other factors that are very important.”

Wilson said he thought the sample size of only 22 businesses was small and would have liked to know the businesses that support the expansion.

The study only went as far as 2000 and Wilson pointed out that many things have changed in the past 12 years but felt that a broader study wasn’t necessary.

Felicia Fefer, spokeswoman for Wal-Mart, said they just heard about the study and are waiting to review it before giving a comment.