FIGURE 1
Red "K's" represent KMarts
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Was Wal-mart to blame? As a simple, unscientific test, we looked at the Atlanta region and plotted the Wal-marts in a 50 mile radius of the downtown area vs. Kmart’s. Of the 10 Kmart’s that are closing, only 3 are within a 10-minute drive time of the nearest Kmart (Drive times represented by "blue" irregular polygons in figure 2). Does geography matter? Of course, but so many factors have contributed to Kmart's failures: price, merchandising, distribution. Convenience, represented by location, is significant and it will be interesting to see if Wal-mart's trade areas vastly expand was Kmart's closures begin to occur.
FIGURE 2
Red "K's" represent KMarts; "happy faces" represent Wal-marts.
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The map was created using Microsoft MapPoint.