Mom-and-Pop Meet Big-Box: Complements or Substitutes?

John Haltiwanger, Ron Jarmin and C.J. Krizan

Working Papers from U.S. Census Bureau, Center for Economic Studies

Abstract: In part due to the popular perception that Big-Boxes displace smaller, often family owned (a.k.a. Mom-and-Pop) retail establishments, several empirical studies have examined the evidence on how Big-Boxes’ impact local retail employment but no clear consensus has emerged. To help shed light on this debate, we exploit establishment-level data with detailed location information from a single metropolitan area to quantify the impact of Big-Box store entry and growth on nearby single unit and local chain stores. We incorporate a rich set of controls for local retail market conditions as well as whether or not the Big-Boxes are in the same sector as the smaller stores. We find a substantial negative impact of Big-Box entry and growth on the employment growth at both single unit and especially smaller chain stores – but only when the Big-Box activity is both in the immediate area and in the same detailed industry.

Keywords: Big-Boxes; Small Business; Retail Trade; Firm Location; Structural Change (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: L16 R30 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 46 pages
Date: 2009-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-com, nep-ent, nep-geo, nep-ind and nep-ure
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www2.census.gov/ces/wp/2009/CES-WP-09-34.pdf First version, 2009 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Chapter: Mom-and-Pop Meet Big-Box: Complements or Substitutes? (2010)
Journal Article: Mom-and-Pop meet Big-Box: Complements or substitutes? (2010)
Working Paper: Mom-and-Pop Meet Big-Box: Complements or Substitutes? (2009)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cen:wpaper:09-34

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