I cant even begin to describe how much the sale of MEC grinds my gears!
I’ve been a member for as long as I can remember, growing up the son of parents who weren’t really interested in being outdoors, the MEC catalogue was a welcome sight when it arrived.
The article echoes my thoughts on MEC in the past 10 years or so, it truly was an event going to MEC (growing up in a town that didn’t have one) but I haven’t found a thing I wanted to purchase in there in years. I regularly receive gift cards, and struggle to use the ones for MEC.
I will say, something about their clothes never quite fit me properly, its like I was in between a medium and large on their sizing.
In speaking to friends who either own an outdoors store, or work in management positions within one, they never really had many good things to say about the co-op. Seems there are several tax incentives related to being a co-op that they were able to exploit, while driving smaller, better staffed stores out of business. This goes a long way to frustrating me even more about this sale, as members, and tax paying citizens of this great land, we would have been artificially propping up this failed business model for quite some time.
It put them in a tricky place, where established brands or suppliers would limit what they would sell to MEC to appease the smaller local shops (which I support), It’s why you cant find the Maxxis tires you, or anyone else is looking for....
I will say, if the inevitable extinction of MEC drives people to support some of those smaller local stores, and maybe inspires the growth and opening of new ones, I say let it die.
MEC was lost a decade ago, maybe its time to let it go...
Sept. 29, 2020, 12:34 p.m. - Onawalk
I cant even begin to describe how much the sale of MEC grinds my gears! I’ve been a member for as long as I can remember, growing up the son of parents who weren’t really interested in being outdoors, the MEC catalogue was a welcome sight when it arrived. The article echoes my thoughts on MEC in the past 10 years or so, it truly was an event going to MEC (growing up in a town that didn’t have one) but I haven’t found a thing I wanted to purchase in there in years. I regularly receive gift cards, and struggle to use the ones for MEC. I will say, something about their clothes never quite fit me properly, its like I was in between a medium and large on their sizing. In speaking to friends who either own an outdoors store, or work in management positions within one, they never really had many good things to say about the co-op. Seems there are several tax incentives related to being a co-op that they were able to exploit, while driving smaller, better staffed stores out of business. This goes a long way to frustrating me even more about this sale, as members, and tax paying citizens of this great land, we would have been artificially propping up this failed business model for quite some time. It put them in a tricky place, where established brands or suppliers would limit what they would sell to MEC to appease the smaller local shops (which I support), It’s why you cant find the Maxxis tires you, or anyone else is looking for.... I will say, if the inevitable extinction of MEC drives people to support some of those smaller local stores, and maybe inspires the growth and opening of new ones, I say let it die. MEC was lost a decade ago, maybe its time to let it go...