At 22 Dec 2007 09:23:34 -0500 Carl wrote:

> When was the last time you shopped in Macy's?

The last time I was in the closest shopping mall.

> Macy's, to me, is
> closer to a high end boutique than a mass-market discounter. They
> carry mainly designer-name lines and sell those things at huge prices.


Frankly, despite your opinion of them, any retailer that anchors a mall in
Independence, Missouri, is a mass market retailer! ;-)

Again, I used Walton as an extreme example. I could've as easily used Ray
Croc vs. Wolfgang Puck.


> They do NOT cater
> to the "masses" though they admittedly attract them: poor people spending
> huge bucks to have clothing with someone else's name on them. This is NOT
a
> Walmart or Target, not a GAP or Old Navy, true "masses" stores by your
> standard.


"Standard?" I think you're confusing "mass market" with Dickens-era England.
Macy's is mass-market, but they're higher-end "snob appeal" mass market
like Apple Computers- sell a product for higher margin than your
competitors and use marketing and reputation to justify the markup- there's
nothing wrong with that.

If Macy's is what you mean by "high-end," then we're not having an
argument! ;-)

> Btw, I'm a Macy's shopper. I was going to use Macy's as my analogy
> but thought it didn't quite make the point because their success at
crossing
> over a wide range of economic levels is so good. But a "masses" store?
No
> way.

Historically, no, but in the last 10 or so years (since the Federated/May
mergers) they've become a suburban gilt-edged Sears.


> My Berkshire Hathaway reference was meant to refer primarily to the
stock,
> which currently sells for something in the neighborhood of $134,000 a
SHARE.

I'd never have thought of analogizing between a retailer and a stock price!
Market forces control the price of a stock, not a company's markup. B-H
is high because they've never split it, not because ir sells at a high
"profit margin."

> Do you think that company is concerned about volume trading?


No, it's concerned about ownership dilution! Look at the Baby Berk shares-
fractional shares of Berk with 1/5 the voting rights vs. dollar value.
Again, you don't buy stock at retail from the company itself, but at least
I kind of follow where you were going with it.


> The secondary
> point is that Berk doesn't do business at the grass-roots level, but at
the
> "holding company" level where he deals with few clients who are willing
to
> pay high prices.

It's not like Sam Walton was still working the register either after
WalMart opened their 1000th store, either.

>It's naive to assume that, at the end, every business
> doesn't eventually filter its way down to the "masses" as you put them.
If
> you do a "family tree" lineage study of any business, it has to end up
down
> there somewhere.

Butler? Yacht designer? ;-)

> My analogy was a good one. That you "fail to see" it is on you.

If you say so. I've just never pictured Walton and Buffet in the same
industry to draw an analogy between them... I guess I should've went with
Kroc and Puck...