(In the previous issue of "Głos", we published the first part of a commentary on the results of a survey study concerning trade. Today, the conclusion).
As for assessments not of the "supply structure" but of how trade functions in Bolesławiec, the respondents’ overall assessment is also worrying: 80 percent do not enjoy shopping, 15 percent enjoy it only "to some extent", and 5 percent have no opinion on the matter.
Obtaining an attractive product is still associated with effort, at least if one does not want to pay an exorbitant price. Negative assessments of how trade functions in Bolesławiec stem from its external structure, characterised by excessive fragmentation and a lack of larger retail stores (superstores).
One of the reasons trade is perceived as deficient is probably that traders have not yet completely shed the habits formed during the era of itinerant and door-to-door trade: they do not display economic acumen—they tend to seek profit from each individual product rather than from the intensity of turnover. Traders still lack initiative and flexibility in responding to consumers’ needs. Let us add that cooperative retail outlets were assessed as the best and more dynamic, which may confirm the thesis about habits and their role. But even here, the aesthetics and ingenuity of product displays hardly impress anyone.
Most Bolesławiec shops are cramped cubbyholes, provisionally adapted for conducting commercial activity. Larger shops, on the other hand, are uninviting and lack proper use of space; despite the large quantity of colourful goods, they exude drabness, resembling a wholesale warehouse more than a modern shop. Of course, macroeconomic phenomena stand behind the lack of opportunities for trade to develop in Bolesławiec: recession, high interest rates, high rents, etc.; however, as the simplest empirical fact, we must accept that the price level in Bolesławiec is the highest in the area, if not one of the highest in the country.
The fact of high prices may be explained by the thesis that a defective trade structure and an inadequate range of goods are at the heart of this phenomenon, since recession and high interest rates are the same throughout the country, yet prices are somewhat lower elsewhere.
Let us explain these relationships using consumers from families with an income of up to 1 million zlotys per person as an example. They shape demand to a considerable extent, and their behaviour shapes the market in no insignificant way. If these consumers cannot find simple and inexpensive goods, they will be forced to limit their consumption of more exclusive and expensive goods, or to give them up entirely. As a result, turnover becomes smaller, and the shop owner offsets losses resulting from the decline in turnover with higher margins on other goods. Prices therefore rise, the intensity of capital turnover decreases again, and the owner must once more increase margins... The mechanism operates again, and an increasing number of goods and people fall into its gears.
Whoever wants to and knows how to break free from this irrational mechanism will undoubtedly contribute to overcoming this crisis, while achieving personal benefits in the process.
(The survey and analysis were prepared at the K. Pachuta Office of Marketing and Market Analyses. Bolesławiec, 22/4 Piastów Street, tel. 86-24).