Saturday, April 16, 2005
Largest and still shrinking
In Fremont, CA there is a store called Tri-City that used to bill itself as the world's largest sporting goods store. No one seemed to know for sure, but they had a big sign out front proclaiming exactly that, so I guess it had to be true. The store consists of two large one-story buildings side by side, surrounded by a huge parking lot with a yellow gate at the entrance that was always swung open. At one corner of the parking lot sits a small Chinese restaurant, as incongruous as a beach house at the North Pole. Usually we describe these things by saying that the buildings are as large as so many football fields, but I have no idea; I just know that they are large and they are many football fields wide. Fremont is a small, quiet, mostly residential town, so it's nice to know that the city had something to offer that was best or most in the world. Although in this case it was more like the best kept secret.
The store sells all kinds of things, from basketball to football to ski stuff, bicycles and hunting gear and ping-pong tables, and sunglasses and athletic apparel too. And that was before they added patio furniture and barbeque grills and water fountains, although they put that in the second building farther away that got much less traffic. Then several years ago, they suddenly stopped promoting themselves as the world's largest sporting goods store. Even changed the store sign. I don't know if they got smaller or someone else got bigger, or perhaps they did some real research and figured out that it was never true. They became just the "world's largest"; largest what they didn't say. Maybe it's world's largest sporting goods and patio furniture store, but that's like saying world's largest sushi and car repair shop -- who's going to compete with that?
I drove by the place the other day and saw a construction fence all around the second building where the patio furniture was. The main building is still open and apparently still doing business, judging by the cars outside. I don't know if they have now decided to downsize themselves to half of what they used to be, or they are building to be bigger than ever before, regain their old title, and maybe add sushi and car repair too. For now, the sign says simply "Tri-City". And the yellow gate is still open, held back by a large concrete slab.
- posted by Woofwoof @ 7:42 AM
