The Best Replacement if Chain Restaurants Close inside Tyler Walmart Locations
There has been many a time when I needed to pick up some groceries but needed to grab some lunch beforehand. It really is true that shopping on an empty stomach is a very bad thing for your diet and your wallet. That's why it's nice that various grocery stores will have some type of café or restaurant inside their store to grab a bite to eat before shopping begins. Well, McDonalds could no longer be an option at a Tyler Walmart. Here's why.
McDonalds restaurants located inside Walmart locations are becoming less profitable for the fast food company (foxbusiness.com). With those declining numbers, stores are closing. In East Texas, Subway seems to be the restaurant of choice inside our Walmart locations. In Tyler, there is one McDonalds left among it's four supercenter locations, the Highway 64 stop.
The locations on South Broadway and Troup Highway each have a Subway.
The Walmart at Loop 323 and Highway 31 East has a KFC inside.
Walmart obviously charges rent for that space and other business opportunities inside their stores. It's a great way to bring in some money for the bottom line. We've got a bank in almost all of our East Texas Walmart locations along with salons, FedEx, nail salons, among others. Walmart is even experimenting with tool rental stores in some Texas locations.
What Walmart should really do is fill these spaces with local small businesses. They won't need a lot of space to start out, which is perfect for this set up and it would diversify even further what Walmart has to offer. I mean, it would be really cool to see a Lola's Handcrafted Kitchen or a Sweet Gourmet or a Sister To Sister Cookies or another of East Texas' great small businesses inside a major chain like Walmart.
So here's the ask, if these chain restaurants were to close their doors tomorrow, what locally owned restaurant or business would you like to see take it's place?