Parking, competition shutter Bangor market
Bottles & Cans, a downtown Bangor-based market, plans to call it a day by the end of March, with a co-owner citing the difficulty in finding parking spots and increased competition from grocery stores as a few of the reasons for shuttering the business.
One of the co-owners of Bottles & Cans, Paul Bosse, said that he believes the high number of parking spots being occupied by employees of downtown businesses made it difficult to attract customers.
There is free two-hour parking at a nearby parking garage, but Bosse told the Bangor Daily News that the distance between the garage and the store is too much when competing with larger grocery stores in the area.
“If it’s not convenient, then we’re not viable,” Bosse said, adding that foot traffic from downtown was lower than originally expected. “Every foot counts, every dollar counts.”
In addition to being more convenient on a foot-traffic level for customers, area grocery stores also moved in on a turf that Bottles & Cans saw as an untapped market when it opened: They’re now offering as well a wider selection of craft beer and wine than was once commonplace.
“I thought we had this little niche in the market, but it went away right after we opened,” Bosse told the BDN.
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