Monday, July 15, 2013

Why the Loblaw takeover of Shoppers won't make downtown life any better--and will probably make it duller

The hegemony of Shoppers Drug Mart in downtown life took a sharp left turn this week with the announcement that Loblaw intends to buy the pharmacy chain for $12.4 million. 

While optimists are hoping for savings though cost-cutting and perhaps loyalty reward synergies between the PC Plus and Optimum programs, the merger will likely speed up the Shoppersization of urban life—big generic chain stores gobbling up prime commercial space, squeezing out the variety and whimsy that makes city life great.

Throughout Toronto’s condo boom, it’s been clear that Shoppers Drug Mart is one of the top choices for anchor tenants in new buildings. (Winners or Marshalls might also do in a pinch.) Of course, why not? A pharmacy is a safer, quieter and less risky choice for storefront space than, say, a nightclub, independent café or niche boutique. But safe choices in retail tenants makes for bland and banal streetscapes. A 25-minute streetcar ride down Queen West from Roncesvalles to University—Canada’s most vibrant shopping street—showcases no fewer than four Shoppers Drug Marts.

Grocery stores aren’t particularly exciting either, but they’re usually in oddball parking-lotted places or, in the case of the two new flagship Loblaw—Maple Leaf Gardens and Queen West at Portland—imaginatively tucked away into larger developments. Target—again, not a retailer known for its beautiful properties but let’s do our best to muster some choices here—has so far only opened stores on the fringes of the city. The chain remains virtually invisible to downtowners. You can complain that Walmart hurts small independent shops, but you can’t complain the stores are eyesores. So far, the retail giant’s only central location is in a mall, though plans to open a new location near Kensington Market are enough to send a chill up the spine of any flaneur.

Shoppers Drug Marts are much more in your face. Small enough to eat up the best most high-traffic locations, big enough to squeeze out three or four small boutiques once they set their sights on a property. Shoppers drug Marts can make even the most unique neighbourhood feel like nowhere at all.

Surprisingly, Pharma Plus and Guardian drugs have done little to take advantage of all the new retail space that’s come available in central Toronto; the expansion of the Pharma Plus at Church and Wellesley seems almost uniquely futile. Which means that the city is not merely awash in new brightly lit pharmacies, but awash in a single pharmacy brand.

A Loblaw/Shoppers merger can only increase the homogenization of our urban landscape. Unless other major retail chains push into downtown—or unless landlords start making it easier for independent stores to get leases—our corridors will be awash in red and white façades, retail spaces that offer a little of everything except personality.


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