mattbell

If you do a google maps search for "trader joe's 94306" you will notice a string of five of them lined up more or less equidistant along the Peninsula as well as another string of three down in San Jose.

A lot of thought surely goes into the precise placement of stores, as the investment per store is huge and mistakes will lead to millions of dollars in lost sales.

Many factors likely go into it -- socioeconomic status and population density of surrounding neighborhoods, placement of competition, proximity to major roads, shopping patterns around the goods being sold etc. These factors are of course different for different types of retailers. It might be fun to see how different chains put up their constellations of stores in major cities.

In retrospect, it's a bit unusual that the Trader Joes are so precisely spaced. It means the population density across the peninsula is fiarly constant, the SES doesn't vary that much, and the development is narrow enough to concentrate the stores along a single line instead of a more spread-out structure.