 Retail sprawl and multi-store firms: An analysis of location choice by retail chainsVladimir Karamychev and Peran van Reeven Regional Science and Urban Economics, 2009, vol. 39, issue 3, 277-286 Abstract: A growing number of cities and towns restrict the number of chain stores within their borders in order to prevent sprawl and increase in traffic problems. This paper verifies these concerns by analyzing endogenous location choices by multi-store firms, which sell heterogeneous products and can charge different prices at every store. It takes a generalized transportation cost approach to Salop [Salop, S.C., 1979. Monopolistic competition with outside goods. Bell Journal of Economics 10, 141-156], in which consumers' utility not only depends on real transportation costs but also on their preferences or tastes. The model confirms that firms' location strategies contribute to retail sprawl. However, the resulting locations actually minimize consumers' generalized transportation costs for given sizes of retail chains. One of the implications is that further concentration in the retail industry is welfare improving. Keywords: Horizontal; differentiation; Multi-store; competition; Location; choice; Random; utility (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:regeco:v:39:y:2009:i:3:p:277-286 Access Statistics for this article Regional Science and Urban Economics is currently edited by D.P McMillen and Y. Zenou More articles in Regional Science and Urban Economics from Elsevier |
Is your work missing from RePEc? Here is how to contribute.
Questions or problems? Check the EconPapers FAQ or send mail to .
EconPapers is hosted by the
School of Business at Örebro University.