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New store keeps Brown & Cole in the express lane: Fairhaven''s Food Pavilion points toward a new direction for company''s marketing and sales. (Conversation - Bill Weymer).

Article Excerpt
Bill Weymer is a big fan of market research. As the vice president of operations for Brown & Cole, it's his job to see what he can do to get the most out of his store locations, so any little tidbit of industry information can be as good as gold.

When your competition ranges from the gigantic (Wal-Mart and Fred Meyer are among the biggest retailers in the world, while Safeway and Albertson's are big by national standards) to companies of similar size (Haggen) to the small-but-flexible (Red Apple stores, Community Food Co-Op), getting the right read on the market is crucial to surviving in such a competitive industry

With so many competitors in town (including the new Fred Meyer shopping center, which opened a 172,000square-foot store in the north part of Bellingham on April 30), at first blush it would seem crazy to open a 40,000square-foot store in a location that already failed once to hold onto a grocery store.

But the market research told Weymer a different story

"I think that as a city, Bellingham has too many grocery stores," Weymer said. "But in the south side, our research told us the area was being underserved, and we felt this was the perfect time to enter that market, no matter what was happening in other parts of town."

Before the remodel took place, the structure for years stood as a reminder of what happens when you don't read the market correctly. The former tenant, Albertson's, lasted just three years after getting an earful from unhappy residents at public planning meetings.

Ever mindful of the mistakes made by the previous tenant, Brown & Cole went...