Up Against the Wal!
If you were an ’80s suburban child like me, you may have moved to New York City to escape the 7-Elevens and cineplexes and mall culture. Then, around 1998 or so—when Manhattan started becoming a mall—maybe you thought, "Well, this isn’t so bad: NYC still has some edge to it. I still may see someone cool like Patti Smith or Kim Gordon on the street. Now at least I can run into Kmart and get cheap underwear before catching the 6 train."
Now it looks like there may be something on its way that is going to take a little more effort to wrap your mind around. Wal-Mart.
The king of big box stores has been making a new push to open an outlet here. Right now, the area’s influential labor unions and Speaker Christine Quinn are holding them back from breaking ground (read sidebar here), but that isn’t stopping them from trying. Nonetheless, Wal-Mart is enacting direct-mail campaigns targeted to constituents—touting low prices and jobs—to put pressure on Council members to make it happen.
And over the past couple of years, Wal-Mart has spent millions burnishing its image, creating a responsive presence on social networking sites, trying its best to dispel the Wall-E image. And this week, you probably saw Wal-Mart CEO Bill Simon with Michelle Obama, in front of a rack of colorful fresh vegetables, announcing that the massive retailer is joining her efforts to fight childhood obesity by reducing the levels of salt, sugar and unhealthy fats in their products, pushing its many suppliers to do the same and lowering the cost of fruits and vegetables as well as adding more Wal-Marts in underserved "food deserts."
The New York City area isn’t quite one of those food deserts, but Wal-Mart is sure making an effort to plant itself in the Big Apple. Do we need to accept the inevitable? Michelle seems to have done that. For her, it makes sense: Getting the megalithic supplier to change its ways will make a broader difference than those fantasy gardens and cute scrubby organic farmer couples profiled lovingly in the New York Times every week—as inspiring as they may be.
But what would a Wal-Mart be like here? We’ve seen the boroughs absorb big box stores, but this one? Having never stepped in one, I asked some friends across the country—in Virginia, Florida, Arkansas and Hawaii—to give me their impressions:
"There’s lots of parking. I got in a fight with a woman in the parking lot because she was trying to peel off the ‘Bush is a War Criminal’ bumper sticker on my car." —Mom in Maui
"It always has this smell that reminds me of my mom’s polyester navy pantsuits from 1972." —Smelly in South Florida
"Its like a Las Vegas casino: You have no idea what time it is when you are inside. It’s the same crowd whether it’s 3 a.m. or 3 p.m." —Sleepless in Sunrise, Fla.
"Someone is always slapping their kid behind you in line." —Annoyed in Alexandria, Va.
"I worked in the original Wal-Mart in Arkansas in the early ’90s, and it hasn’t changed a bit." —Lonely in Little Rock
"You can buy toilet paper, thongs, Wal-Mart wine, pacifiers, condoms and Legos all in the same place."—Busy in Boca
"I think it’s had a bad rap. It’s just like any other box store. It’s just like Target. But not as good clothing." —Considerate in California
If and when the store does land, it’s easy to imagine it absorbing the merchants that surround it in a 2-mile radius, like some thirsty parasite plant soaking up nutrients in the soil. Think of how Astor Place has changed into its current Starbucks-Kmart-Walgreens trifecta of mass consumerism. Or Union Square, where you can go to Best Buy, Toys "R" Us and then try your best to make it through the throngs of people to enter the cacophonic Whole Foods and get your salmon burger.
In my neighborhood, at the crossroads of Atlantic and Flatbush in Brooklyn, the presence of the hugely trafficked Target shopping center at the Atlantic Terminal has been awkwardly absorbed into daily life. Nearby there are still independent clothing stores, hair braiding salons and dive bars, but every day I see scads of people walking through the streets near my place carrying their emblazoned Target bags. (When people ask where I live, I now call it Targetsburg.) For now, there is a contentious—but relatively peaceful—coexistence there. (I’ll get back to you when the Ratner project is finished.)
Of course, there are some New York things that Wal-Mart won’t be able to obliterate with its presence, unless it decides to have a Pilates studio or wine bar or elevated High Line park in its store. (Hey, if Duane Reade can serve up growlers of beer in Williamsburg, why not?) In a way, the presence of big box stores in the city have only burnished the style and fashion around it into a glossier sheen. Places like Daniel or BAM or the planned new Whitney Museum only seem more polished. In tandem with Wal-Mart’s encroaching presence is Kim and Kourtney Take New York.
If (and when) the retail juggernaut does come, its presence will be definitive of the state of the city. It will indicate how desperate we may be for work—any work. It will be a further sharpening of the edge between high and low, luxury and convenience, rich and poor. And it will show us all how far we are willing to let the city change to be able to buy thongs and pacifiers in the same place.
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