The Star Isn't as Bleak on Mission Gateway

Out local Star paper ran the following article today.

Future of Johnson County’s Mission Gateway 

in question

On their website, it had this headline:

‘We’ve waited so long’: Future of Johnson County project in question, funds in limbo

A bit from the article:

The property has the hallmarks of an active construction project: a yellow crane, orange cones and temporary chain link fencing. But there are no sounds of dirt moving or concrete being poured. And no workers in sight.

After 15 years of delays and tempered expectations, work has once again halted at the ill-fated $225 million Mission Gateway development in Johnson County. And it’s unclear if or when it might start back up.

And check out this ugliness.

Workers left the site after two major funding sources were put on hold during the coronavirus pandemic. Since then, at least a dozen liens have been filed on the property, claiming invoices have gone unpaid to contractors and suppliers.

“We have not been paid,” said Jerry Messick, one of the contractors and owner of Metro Interiors in Lee’s Summit. “I can tell you that without any guilt because it really pisses me off.”
Keeping in mind, as the article states, too, this has been going on for 15 years. Wow.

So true. So very true. I wrote and posted this July 16, last week.

Mission Gateway: 

The Construction Project From Hell

To say, however, that the project is "in question" when you have a huge slump in retail shopping anyway and then now, this pandemic which makes even construction difficult, let alone, again, weakens that same retail shopping and, for the foreseeable future, dining out, restaurant business and then movie-going, too. Yes, it makes the funding of this project highly suspect, if not out and out deeply in doubt to very unlikely. Funding is drying up all over but especially here, on this nightmare.

I say again,  what should happen is the developer finally, finally faces the ugly reality, declares bankruptcy on the entire project then donates the land, the entire site, to the city of Mission for a park.

It won't but that's what should happen.

At one point in the article, the Star asks if it wasn't "The right idea at the wrong time."

To which I'd answer no. It was never the right idea. The former site worked and was good-looking and well-placed. It should have been updated, at most.  And all this was, of course, at the worst possible time, for all the reasons I mention in my post above--the 2008 financial collapse, the collapse of retail and now this pandemic and all it brings down on everything here.

Good luck, Mission.

You're gonna' need it.

Huge Changes Coming To Us All

Have you read about these mergers and purchases lately?

Amazon to Buy Whole Foods 

for $13.4 Billion

It seems Amazon is going to control a great deal of our otherwise retail purchases and purchasing. Up to now, it's been hard goods. Now they look to be getting extremely serious about the food markets, too.

It had a huge, nearly immediate effect on markets and companies, too.

Amazon-Whole Foods threat wipes out 

$40 billion in market value

Amazon Buying Whole Foods: 

Grocery Store Stocks Get Hammered

Amazon Deal for Whole Foods Starts 

a Supermarket War

With this one purchase, suddenly they're huge, nationally, in the food business.

Amazon 'will be a top 5 grocer in the US' 

with Whole Foods acquisition

Here's a good share of the reason for it all.

Wal-Mart in the Crosshairs of 

Amazon's Takeover of Whole Foods

Here's what it all boils down to.

The Amazon-Walmart Showdown 

That Explains the Modern Economy

Behemoths In a Battle To Sell You Everything

Meanwhile, retail and retail stores and retail buying all over the nation are getting also hammered, along with their stock prices.

The Great Retail Apocalypse of 2017

What this means is that no one really knows where we're headed Well, except that we're headed online, more and yet more all the time.

Department stores are failing -- 

here's where everyone is buying

And it's all kinds of stores right down to the dollar stores.

Taking the Dollar-Store Concept Online

How The Online Dollar Store Startup Hollar 

Found Success

Besides reshaping retail and how and why we buy, it also means what our communities and cities look like and how they're built.

Dying shopping malls are wreaking havoc 

on suburban America

10 new uses for abandoned malls

7 Dead Shopping Malls That Found 

Surprising Second Lives

Here's What's Becoming Of America's Dead 

Shopping Malls

Shopping centers look to entertainment, 

recreation to fill empty

anchors

Of course there's money--lots of big money--in health care so why wouldn't this happen, right?

America's Dying Malls Are Getting 

a Second Chance as Hospitals

The fact is, stores and business and retail and so, our cities and our lives are changing and the changes are coming and will be coming at us fast. Very, very fast. 

It's a lot like the current Presidential Administration.

Completely unpredictable.

Hold onto your hats, ladies and gentlemen. It's going to be a bumpy ride.

Links:

Jeff Bezos is the smartest guy in business

Amazon-Whole Foods deal could mean new phase of retail

Why Amazon is buying Whole Foods

Rooted in Counterculture, Whole Foods’ Founder Finds an Unlikely Refuge

Not done there, there was also this, just this week. Not as big but still significant.

Walmart to Buy Bonobos, Men's Wear Company, 

for $310 Million

And for a bit of fun:

Tweets react to Amazon buying Whole Foods, 

riff on overpriced groceries

What Should Happen With the Mission Mall Site

Here it is as it stands right this moment. Still. It is still and it is still basically an ugly lot.

What should happen with it?

What should happen with this now-eyesore is that it should be given up, sold, I suppose, to the city for some reasonable fee and made into a park. It should be made into a city park. It would be a fantastic entrance into the small city, and it would enhance the entire area around it.

What should have happened, years ago, is that the mall should never have been torn down and leveled into the, again, eyesore it is now and has become and that it has been for some time. Even without hindsight it should have been known it shouldn't have been leveled and wasted. It needed upgrading, improving, but it fit the site, it was not ugly, it wasn't an ugly mall, it wasn't run that run down and vacated.

No doubt the developer got greedy. He no doubt thought this would somehow be a great idea and make him loads more money.

Man, was he wrong.

Sure, the 2008 financial collapse brought this mess on, too, but the whole notion of leveling a functional and again, not completely unattractive shopping center just so someone could, hopefully, make boodles more money was short-sighted and just downright greedy.

Now?

Now Walmart has backed out of the plans to locate in what the developer thought was going to be an upcoming, new center. Good luck finding another large tenant now. I feel certain there are and were plenty, plenty of Mission residents who didn't want the Walmart/Roeland Park customers coming down the hill to this site, anyway.

Another point, have you seen the latest reports on retail this week? Where retail is headed, it seems clear?

Retail collapse: The 23 biggest chains 

closing stores this year

"Retailers Are Running Out Of Time"

Cramer warns the collapse 

of department stores 

cannot be dismissed

Retail Collapsing Nationwide - 

Massive Layoffs

Heck, even Walmart is hurting.

With 269 Stores Closing, 

Is this the Beginning of the End 

for Walmart?

And here's why.

Online Sales Soar while 

Brick-and-Mortar Stores Crumble

So yes, this is what should happen. Turn it over. Make it into a park. They could even call it Mission  Gateway Park.

It won't but that's what should happen.

Eat your heart out, Northwest Missouri

Maybe even "Eat your heart out, America"

It's one or the other, folks

Which will it be?

It just makes sense.

It's also the decent thing to do.

And human.

And humane.

And "Christian."

Amazon has revenge on and tries to punish Missouri

I just got this email this evening, from Amazon.  Seems they're upset. They don't like what's come out of our statehouse:


Greetings from the Amazon Associates Program.

We are writing from the Amazon Associates Program to notify you that your Associates account will be closed and your Amazon Services LLC Associates Program Operating Agreement will be terminated effective August 27, 2013. This is a direct result of the unconstitutional Missouri state tax collection legislation passed by the state legislature and signed by Governor Nixon on July 5, 2013, with an effective date of August 28, 2013. As a result, we will no longer pay any advertising fees for customers referred to an Amazon Site after August 27 nor will we accept new applications for the Associates Program from Missouri residents.

Please be assured that all qualifying advertising fees earned prior to August 28, 2013 will be processed and paid in full in accordance with your regular advertising fee schedule. Based on your account closure date of August 27, 2013, any final payments will be paid by October 31, 2013.

While we oppose this unconstitutional state legislation, we strongly support the federal Marketplace Fairness Act now pending before Congress. Congressional legislation is the only way to create a simplified, constitutional framework to resolve interstate sales tax issues and it would allow us to re-open our Associates program to Missouri residents.

We thank you for being part of the Amazon Associates Program, and look forward to re-opening our program when Congress passes the Marketplace Fairness Act.


Sincerely,

The Amazon Associates Team
_________________________________

To which I respond:

Dear Amazon:

FO.

Just because you don't like it doesn't make it "unconstitutional."  Just ask retailers.


Sincerely,

Mo Rage

"Thank you"

Thank you.

Yes, thank you.

Thank you and have a great day.

Yes, please, thank you.

There.

Is that so difficult?

How is it these few little words--possibly as few as two--are so rare in business today?

So beautiful, so easy, so nice to hear.

You go to a store or restaurant (more likely a retail store, I think)--maybe out of your way to go there--and it gets nearly impossible to have the person at the register say "Thank you."

Is that so difficult?

And "Have a nice day" is not "thank you", okay?  It's not a substitute.

Retail and grocery stores are the biggest offenders, by far, I think. The businesses want your business and they want you to come back but I'll be danged if the person at the register has been trained to say those two little words. Once in a great while it will come out but extremely rarely.

I need to give Human Resource training on it to company's employees.

I'd make millions.

"YOU KIDS GET OFF MY LAWN!!!"

Gas across Western Missouri

From Springfield to Kansas City, Friday to Saturday this weekend:

Springfield:  $3.28/gal

Higginsville (least expensive anywhere I saw):  $3.10/gal

Independence:  $3.12/gal

Raytown (not far from Indep):  $3.22/gal

Roeland Park, KS:  $3.35/gal


Interesting.  (To  me, anyway).  Quite a spread in price.

McDonald's could be a much better corporate citizen--quickly and easily

 

A friend of mine goes to McDonald's each and every morning for breakfast and I've joined him at times (for the oatmeal, hold the brown sugar, thanks very much) so I've been reminded lately who they are and what they do. It had been some time--years, really--since I'd been in.

And a few things occurred to me.

The first is that how much each of them, separately, and then all of them, together end up putting into the waste dumps in the country and world daily and yearly.

Then, a great, easy, intelligent solution to it all also occurred to me.

All the McDonald's across the country need to institute plastic and paper recycling programs and as soon as possible.

If you think about it, everything they generate, from their meals, is either plastic or paper, right off those trays.

If they were to recycle all that, can you imagine the millions of pounds of both they could recycle each year?

It would be fantastic.

And the great thing about it is that it would be simple and easy for them to do.  Think about this. They have all those waste receptacles, already in their restaurants (using the word very loosely, no disrespect meant).  If they were simply and inexpensively labeled "Plastic" on one and "Paper" on the one next to it, the patrons could--again, quickly and easily--dispose of each in the respective container. Then, the employee whose job it is to keep up with the dining room could pull out those bags from the containers, collect them and have them placed in the restaurant for pickup.

So simple.  No additional cost, either, with the exception of the small signs needed.

Then, for McDonald's, what a public relations boon for them. Total win.  They could advertise that the people could come get the same food they always did and now, with this, it could also be a far greener experience.

Will it happen?

I doubt it.  I hope it but doubt it seriously.

It's got to start somewhere. 

This would be a great time and place.

How NOT to do a convenience store

Service with a snarl.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

Link:  Kum & Go :: 24-Hour Convenience Store

Kmart advertising is on a roll

First they had the one so you could ship yer pants:



Now this:



I didn't need to ship my pants but I surely want big gas savings.

They had my attention before.  Now they may get my business.

Three things occur to me about this:

First, it's brilliant.

Second, it may be the one thing that saves them, Kmart.

Third, look for more advertising agencies and companies to follow this trend because it's so funny, so simple and so effective, if/when it does go viral.

KC Barbecue gets heads up from Bon Appétit

Here it is, this time Trader Joe's Kansas City style barbecue sauce gets the raves with coverage on Yahoo! News last evening:

Supermarket Standoff: Barbecue sauces

Bon Appétit

When they're not busy tasting dishes over and over, Bon Appétit's food editors are tasting other stuff like different brands of chicken stock. Because while we're into making things from scratch, sometimes there just isn't time to brown veal bones for rich broth, or simmer strawberries into preserves. When we do cut corners, though, we want to do it in the tastiest possible way -- hence the taste tests of store-bought items.

Today's item: barbecue sauce.

Sure, food editor Hunter "Carolina Boy" Lewis might have a mean recipe handed down to him by his great grandfather, but most of us don't.

The good news? Many bottled sauces -- some of them made by big companies, some of them by two dudes with a passion and a big ol' stockpot -- are darn good. Here are six of our favorites.

Trader Joe's Kansas City Style

"This is a total cheat sheet sauce." Translation: It's adaptable, and you could "put it on chicken and fake that it's charred." It's smoky, sweet, and has a pronounced tomato flavor.

$2.69 at Trader Joe's in New York City.

The conclusion?

Trader Joe's has been good for Kansas City and in return, Kansas City has been good for and to Trader Joe's.

Bon appétit, indeed.

Link: http://shopping.yahoo.com/news/supermarket-standoff--barbecue-sauces.html

On the proliferation of inexpensive wine

First, there was, rather famously, "two-buck Chuck", introduced by Trader Joes.

And thank goodness for that.

They started the trend, I think we can say, clearly. That is, a fairly good, everyday table wine.

Of course, for the longest time, we couldn't get it here since we had no such store. Fortunately for us, that's changed with them having come to Ward Parkway Center.

Then, naturally, Walmart had to get in the mix so they introduced their own private label wine for nearly the same price. (It's actually about 20 cents less per bottle, as it should be. The quality, if you can call it that--"quality"--at this price level), is just not quite as good.

Now, I just learned last evening that local grocery store Hy-Vee has their own private label wine for $3 a bottle.

From what I understand, there is actually a glut of oil on the world markets.

I don't know. I can't check that out.

But I do know there is a glut of pretty good, inexpensive wine in the retail markets.

And for that, I'm grateful.

Very grateful.

Have a great weekend, y'all. And drink responsibly, if at all.

A PhD to buy a light bulb now?

Have you been to buy a light bulb lately?

Holy cow.

I went the other day to a Lowe's and then to a Home Depot.

First, you have to know the regular bulbs are going away. There are darn few of those.

After that, it's a whole new ballgame.

You need to know there are two options.

The first option is all the new fluorescent bulbs.

Sure, they save money and electricity and energy, more than anything.

You have to see how many Kelvins and lumens so you have the right coloring of the bulb in your room(s).

If you also need a 3-way bulb, fugghedaboudit. There are very few of those. And some of them are just bloody huge. They could be as big as a grown man's fist.

Then there's pricing.

If they're cheap, they only cost a little over $8.00.

Each.

They're supposed to last far longer but some friends have one that blew after less than a year.

Apparently we're supposed to start files at home, keeping track of how long ago we've bought these things and where.

The second option--you'll love this--are the LED bulbs.

Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of LED bulbs since they last far longer than all the other bulbs--supposedly--but also, they aren't nearly as hot as halogens. (I'm not even going into those here. Suffice to say, they're bloody hot).

Then there's your second option. LED bulbs.

They're a whole 'nother issue. And education.

Same deal, too, where you have to look at how many lumens they put out but also different shapes and sizes.

And now, here again, the issue of price.

Holy cow. These things can cost you $40 for one bulb.

So if you haven't been out lately, to one of the big stores, be ready for a real education.

Book a lot of time.

You'll be there for a while.

After all, a doctorate in lighting takes some time.

I wish you good luck. And a lot of time.

Nike ad for "the Paris of the Plains"

Yessir, Kansas City, you're getting mentioned. I think we've become "cool." (Thanks to local photographer extraordinaire Roy Inman for the link).

World's Window closed

World's Window, the retailing accessory/gift shop in Brookside is closed. But just for this week. They are closed today, Sunday, January 29 through Sunday, February 5th for remodeling. They reopen Monday, February 6. Wishing them good luck on the work, for sure.

Shoot me, I love Trader Joe's

In case you hadn't seen it already: Besides, they used that perfect, catchy tune, right?

I'm so old

...the young woman at the checkout counter didn't know anything about my favorite candy.

THAT old.

The Apple premium

I needed a pair of headphones for my ipod shuffle and was on the Plaza so I stopped in to see how much they'd be. I figured they couldn't be that much and I like the white ones they have so I'd check it out. I asked a "genius" (I'm not being sarcastic) for their "best, least expensive" ones and he said they were---gulp---$49.95. I was stunned. Not only that but they went up to as high as $79.95 for the "really good ones", I presume. Well, it didn't take me long to blow that off and go up the street to Radio Shack. The difference? Here you go:

Again, Apple earbuds--$49.95/pair. The "knockoffs"? Some other brand's earbuds?

As you can see, an Auvio brand (never heard of them) in black for--check this out--$9.95/pair. Now, I ask you, why would I not pocket the $40.00 minimum savings? Yikes.

Sears, K-Mart to only close one KC store

Breaking news: HOFFMAN ESTATES, Ill. -- "Sears Holdings Corporation released an initial list on Thursday afternoon of Sears and Kmart stores it plans to close, including two in the Kansas City metro. The Sears store at 601 North M-291 in Lee's Summit, Mo." The one in Lawrence on Iowa Street will also close. "The date of their closure were not included in the list provided by Sears Holdings Corporation." Link: http://www.kmbc.com/news/30097370/detail.html#ixzz1hxnIE0FQ