Retail Sales in County : Some Smaller Cities Attract Many Buyers

A city’s size doesn’t always matter when it comes to retail spending. For instance, Costa Mesa is only the seventh largest city in the county. But it also is the home of megamall South Coast Plaza, which helped push the community to the No. 3 ranking among county cities in taxable retail sales during the second quarter of 1987, according to the State Board of Equalization. And Irvine, which has the Irvine Auto Center, was No. 4. Not surprisingly, the county’s two largest cities, Anaheim and Santa Ana, were ranked first and second in taxable sales for the quarter. The retail data tracks sales in apparel, general merchandise, restaurants, food and liquor stores, service stations, car dealers and auto supplies.

HOW COUNTY CITIES COMPARE IN RETAIL SALES

Apparel

Costa Mesa . . . $36,643

Newport Beach . . . $18,379

Orange . . . $14,212

Westminster . . . $12,482

Huntington Beach . . . $11,222

General Merchandise

Costa Mesa . . . $104,803

Santa Ana . . . $55,411

Orange . . . $39,075

Huntington Beach . . . $38,671

Westminster . . . $30,638

Food

Anaheim . . . $28,904

Santa Ana . . . $27,160

Huntington Beach . . . $19,378

Garden Grove . . . $18,882

Westminster . . . $12,057

Eating & Drinking

Anaheim . . . $60,894

Santa Ana . . . $45,486

Newport Beach . . . $42,964

Huntington Beach . . . $36,475

Orange . . . $31,606

TAXABLE SALES, 2ND QUARTER 1987

Sales (in thousands City of dollars) Rank *Population Rank Anaheim $722,940 1 241,901 1 Santa Ana 571,377 2 237,839 2 Costa Mesa 465,219 3 87,820 7 Irvine 410,865 4 86,938 8 Huntington Beach 382,715 5 184,748 3 Orange 382,127 6 100,703 6 Garden Grove 316,410 7 133,121 4 Fullerton 260,897 8 108,262 5 Newport Beach 246,557 9 66,367 10 Buena Park 214,587 10 66,081 11 Westminster 184,452 11 73,954 9 Tustin 147,946 12 35,152 17 Brea 127,961 13 33,432 18 Fountain Valley 87,350 14 55,551 12 La Habra 86,991 15 48,418 13 Placentia 60,532 16 38,477 15 Cypress 57,005 17 42,593 14 Stanton 50,998 18 27,400 20 Los Alamitos 49,449 19 11,468 24 San Clemente 46,078 20 31,240 19 San Juan Capistrano 42,453 21 23,132 22 Laguna Beach 38,323 22 18,881 23 Yorba Linda 25,089 23 37,795 16 Seal Beach 25,014 24 26,244 21

* 1987 estimate.

Sources: State Board of Equalization and Donnelly Demographics