And when Eisen looks at the average price of items sold, her Hawkins location come in second, but just barely. Then there is the personal touch. Eisen grew up on the Westside, and knows most of her customers there. She says she's working to develop personal relationships with her Eastside clientele. One of the biggest things often overlooked by retailers is a location that will draw customers from other nearby tenants.
Customers like to bundle their shopping as conveniently as possible.
It's not always best to be off by yourself. Dan Einhorn found that out the hard way. In 1996 he opened an Eastside location on George Dieter. But now he knows he was ahead of the curve. Out there all alone, in a brand new, mostly empty strip mall, there was plenty of street traffic but precious little in the store.