How important is the spreading of stores in each city

[SpitZ]

Hey everyone, still a noob at this game, do I need to spread out my retail stores selling the same products or can i just keep them close to save on freighting costs, local demand is quite hard to understand how bigh a impact it has for me.

[Stylesjl]

Hey everyone, still a noob at this game, do I need to spread out my retail stores selling the same products or can i just keep them close to save on freighting costs, local demand is quite hard to understand how bigh a impact it has for me.

You should spread the stores out and ensure that they are placed in high traffic areas. If you have too many stores together they will compete against each other so you should only do it if there are so many customers that one store can't handle it (if stores get too many customers you can also try using training to increase capacity as well).

Freight costs can be managed by making sure that your factories are placed close to the high traffic stores but in general it also depends on the product. Some products have high freight costs (like food or beverages) while others have low costs (Jewelry).

It might be worthwhile to check the beginner's guide:
https://www.capitalismlab.com/beginners_guide/

[dosenöffner]

Hey everyone, still a noob at this game, do I need to spread out my retail stores selling the same products or can i just keep them close to save on freighting costs, local demand is quite hard to understand how bigh a impact it has for me.

From my experience i would say roundabout 10 fields of distance should be ok to not get in the influencesphere of your next retailshop.
I tend to place them 15-20 fields distant if it's possible, but customer traffic is the main factor here.

Otherwise it's like Stylesjl said and you lose customers from your other shop. That's only an option if the demand is very, very high and your units are already on LV9. Don't underestimate the leveling/training of your personal, it makes a huge difference in throughput!