Downers: Business is Bleak on Ventura Boulevard

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[Image via the Daily News]

Feeling excessively cheery today? Take care of that quick with this look at faltering businesses on Ventura Boulevard in Sherman Oaks from the Daily News. Of the stores profiled in the article, only the gym and the shoe repair place are going strong. Everyone else is cutting prices, offering coupons, and panicking about how hard it is to get shoppers to actually enter their doors. As for the customers that do show up: "It's harder to convince people to pay what we're charging," said the owner of the Beeta Salon. That's not exactly a surprise, but when you think of it in the context of the past decade, it sort of boggles the mind. A year ago, was anyone haggling over a $30 haircut?
· Hard times hit Ventura Boulevard [Daily News]