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Has anyone seen a small independent store that has a way to order from their own website, in the store? Above the book, have a qr code or url that points to the item on their site, but they get it in 3-4 days later. 'Buy it now off the shelf' for a fiver more than that.

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A store local to me (Blackbird in Ballard) has a branch in Portland now and will often requisition items from the other branch for you to try or buy. The same happens on a larger scale at large department stores such as Barneys, where SAs will often call around to other branches to see if they have the particular piece you're looking for in the proper size (the inventory systems often are slow to update)

That's just window dressing on the problem. The merchant still has the overhead of a paying for the store hence the price he can offer the product for will reflect that. Even if they had coffee, a warm blanket, and comfortable shoes for you to sit at the kiosk and order the same book just mere steps from you. It'll still cost more.

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