Best Buy's Big Box Purge

Best Buy is learning the hard way that bigger isn't always better.

Following their reported fourth-quarter net-loss of $1.7 billion, the electronics retailer recently announced that it plans to close 50 of its big box locations throughout North America and open 100 of its smaller Best Buy Mobile stores. Of the stores that are closing, most are located on the edge of a city or suburban center and are surround by other familiar retailers who have, for decades, embraced the development model of building big box stores surrounded by vast parking lots on cheap land. By my count, 18 of the planned closures are in "very walkable" areas, according to Walk Score. But of those 18, only three — in Baltimore, Boston, and Los Angeles — are in truly urban settings, surrounded by more than just parking lots and similarly large buildings.