Action: "If Wal-Mart wishes to move into your neighborhood against the wishes of the neighborhood, what actions should Wal-Mart take? Under what conditions would it be wise for it to withdraw its move?" Peter F. Drucker
I have a home, where I lived for three plus years, in Laguna Beach Ca. A (most times) wonderful community by the Pacific ocean. Approximately 23,000 people with an annual per capita income above $58,000 last time I looked... Fairly affluent, but not even in the top 100 of U.S. locations with more than 2000 inhabitants. The main attractions in Laguna are: Art, Art, and Art (fine, performing, sun), and a very independently minded community which opens to, but shrinks back from hordes of tourists every year. There is no Wal-Mart, or for that matter any other large national chain located within the "city walls". LB has fought them off.
There are few roads leading in or out of the sleepy beachside community of Laguna Beach, making it a repository for many 1920s artists and counter-culture activists from nearby Los Angeles who settled the charming cottages tucked along the Laguna’s rolling hillsides. During the late ’50s and early ’60s, Laguna Beach nurtured a handful of key artists from the surf community. This has changed somewhat, but most of those who move there want to perpetuate the 'feeling'.
I understand why Wal-Mart was not allowed 'in'. I even agree with it. NIMBY (Not in my back yard). Even the hardware store is still a small, crammed family operation at the corner of PCH and (I don't remember). They used to know me... and where my Art was showing. Besides, do you know what land costs in LB?
Why would you want to fight that culture? Why destabilize this?
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