Major Retail Chains That "Skipped" Your Area, Past or Present?

[formulanone]

Publix

They serve Middle and East Tennessee, but don't serve West Tennessee, I feel they can serve both Memphis and Jackson.

They would probably need a closer distribution center for their fresh foods. Nashville is as far west as they go in the Volunteer State.

At the rate they expand, give them 3-10 years.

[tmoore952]

"Area" in this case being my town and a 10 mile radius around it.

This is passe now, but we never had a new bookstore in my town. We did have a used one for about six months, around 2010.
10 miles to the west puts you in the I-270 corridor which is where the new bookstores are/were.

[Daniel Fiddler]

Well, Jackson and the Memphis suburbs can absolutely support one.

I created a chart for West Tennessee showing where could and could not support one:

[freebrickproductions]

I think it's just because they haven't gone west of the Alabama/Mississippi state line yet. There ain't any in Mississippi either, for example.

[Daniel Fiddler]

I think it's just because they haven't gone west of the Alabama/Mississippi state line yet. There ain't any in Mississippi either, for example.

Quite possible.

I didn't think of that.

Although they serve Middle and East Tennessee and skipped West, which didn't make sense since Germantown, Collierville, and Bartlett are certainly affluent enough to support one.  And Jackson has "commuters" from all over the western part of the state for their shopping, dining, and medical needs, pretty much all counties except Shelby.

[US 89]

It's not a skip if the "skipped" area is farther away geographically than anywhere currently served.

It's like me complaining that there are no Cook Out locations in Florida. Could Tallahassee support one? Absolutely it could. But they're based in North Carolina and have only expanded south as far as Alabama and Georgia. We don't have one here because we're too far away from their current footprint. Supposedly we're getting one soon in Tallahassee; when that opens, it's not like they will have "skipped" Miami...it's just so far south of their territory.

[Daniel Fiddler]

It's not a skip if the "skipped" area is farther away geographically than anywhere currently served.

It's like me complaining that there are no Cook Out locations in Florida. Could Tallahassee support one? Absolutely it could. But they're based in North Carolina and have only expanded south as far as Alabama and Georgia. We don't have one here because we're too far away from their current footprint. Supposedly we're getting one soon in Tallahassee; when that opens, it's not like they will have "skipped" Miami...it's just so far south of their territory.

They serve Richmond, Virginia and will shortly be serving Louisville, Kentucky.  Both cities are further than Memphis and Jackson.

But I guess you're right.  Memphis and Jackson are further WEST than they have expanded yet.

[Sctvhound]

I wish y'all had gotten to experience Sonic before it sucked. Early 2000s Sonic was incredible.

Sonic was in all the rural areas before it moved everywhere then. Summerville, Moncks Corner, and Goose Creek all were very suburban areas, Moncks Corner more rural, and Sonic was already there in all by 1997.

They used to show ads on TV which would flash the locations. 

[Daniel Fiddler]

These aren't exactly my area (Jackson), but major companies that skipped areas NEAR me, and these can be considered legitimate skipping, not "not expanding further":

Bahama Breeze and Capital Grille skipped Nashville.  Not Darden entirely, just those particular restaurants.  Metro Nashville has over 2.2 million and can support both.  Neither serve Jackson, but Jackson is not large enough to support them.

Starbuck's skipped indubitably Dyersburg and possibly Union City and Martin.  The former one is absolutely large enough and affluent enough (15,000 and $45,000 a year), and is on an Interstate, even if just a 3DI now, although I-69 will be coming in later.  The latter two there have been smaller towns that have supported Starbuck's, and I-69 will eventually arrive in Union City, and Martin has a major university.  Starbuck's does serve Jackson, there are eight here.  There are more Starbuck's here than there are McDonald's and almost as many as there are Sonics.

Chick-Fil-A skipped Union City and Martin as well.  They serve McKenzie of all places, if McKenzie is large enough, Union City and Martin are plenty large enough for damn sure.  They serve Jackson, we got I think three here.