HERBERGERS

                                                         

A while back we were informed that Herbergers Department Store was closing in Brainerd. They’re just another victim in a fast changing world, when it comes to retail shopping. I can complain about it and I can write about it-- but there seems to be no stopping it. All over this nation big box stores are shutting their doors and often times taking down whole shopping Malls down with them.

I lived in a twin city suburb years ago next to a mall called Brookdale. It had stores like Dayton’s and Donaldson’s. J.C. Penny’s and Sears. It wasn’t just a shopping center it was a social center with all of its little specialties shops. I remember browsing for books at Barns and Nobles and getting my shoes repaired at a cobblers shop, all in the comfort of an indoor mall. There were always civic events going on in the mall and great restaurants to eat in. But they all existed, dependent on each other to bring in the people.  A few years back it was bulldozed and now in its place, sits a lonely Walmart with one huge parking lot.

Maybe it’s just the change I can’t accept. I’m old and it’s a whole new way of life for me. I’m not reluctant to change. I have an I-phone and a computer. But I still like to shop and try clothes on. Talk to a knowledgeable hardware man about repairs. I think the greatest thing we are losing; besides the jobs the store’s provided, is the interaction we had between friends and neighbors. Instead we choose to stay cloistered in our homes having a delivery service bring us our groceries and clicking away at some online site to buy everything. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted.

Change is inevitable in this fast paced world. I remember as a boy watching the steam engines coming into Staples where I grew up. These steel behemoths belching steam and smoke, pulled over a hundred loaded boxcars and had been around for over a hundred years and they had a lot to do with the expansion of this country from east to west. I used to go over to the roundhouse where they garaged and serviced these giant machines of burden and stand in awe of them. Then one day in the late fifties I noticed many of them gone, parked on a siding idled and quiet. I asked my dad who was a railroader what was going on? He told me, “take a good look at them son, their days are numbered.” So was the railroad in Staples.

Staples, through innovation survived but it was never the same for me. Brainerd will survive too without Herbergers but the empty J. C Penny store a mile away is testament as to how hard it will be for someone to fill that space. Hopefully the mall will survive. Maybe Ascensus could use another location or maybe they can park discarded Volkswagens in the parking lot? I’m being facieses but sometimes that’s all you have left. Pat and I drive back from Arizona in the springtime on somewhat of a back road to avoid the freeways. We drive through a lot of small towns in Oklahoma and North Texas. The roadsides are bordered with hundreds of shuttered storefronts. What used to be small thriving downtowns is now a graveyard for mom and pop businesses. The town now gets by with a Circle K and a Walmart.