There are very few department store chains in Canada. Almost all of the ones from my childhood are gone. (Okay, Iām old, but most of the stores from my kidsā childhood are also gone.)
Their first baby photos were taken at Sears ā¦ gone. My first job was at Woolco ā¦ gone. All of their baby clothes came from Zellers ā¦ gone. All of the decorations for my first Christmas tree came from Eatonās ā¦ gone. K-Mart blue light specials ā¦ gone.
No more Towers, no more Simpsons, no more Loweās. And donāt even get me started on Tar-Jayās epic 22 month/133 store flameout! (To be fair, Target deserved to tank here; they treated the Canadian consumer as if we second rate Americans. Weāre not.)
Now you know why so many Canadians cross-border shop. 90% of us live within 160 km (100 miles) of the US border, and 70% of us have passports. Buffalo retailers credit Canadians with keeping their malls and stores in business during your last big economic downturn. Not kidding, they would see the four curved lines on our credit cards (indicating contactless payment YEARS before you guys had it) and they would immediately know we were Canadian and thank us effusively.
I have no idea why Iāve gone on this tangent, but Iāve typed it all out (with one finger!), so Iām hitting reply.