While Yelm’s sales declines look negligible, they stand out because these figures are the opposite of the trends in other cities in the county. Yelm has also lost some local businesses in the last year, including Yelm Hardware.

– “Thurston County retail sales rise 5 percent in Q2” – [Yelm’s decline]

By Rolf Boone in The Olympian:
“Retail sales in Thurston County and most of its largest jurisdictions experienced an uptick in business during the second quarter of the year, according to new data released Monday by the state Department of Revenue.
The two exceptions were in Lacey and Yelm, which saw slight declines in one or both categories of taxable retail sales. Yelm fell in both categories.

Taxable retail sales data for all industries in Thurston County and its largest cities for the second quarter of 2013/2014:
Yelm: Fell 2.34 percent to $42.1 million from $43.1 million. [one million dollars less]

The state also releases a separate category of taxable retail sales data that better reflects consumer spending.

Heres how the county and its largest cities did in the same year-over-year period:

Thurston County: Rose 4.82 percent to $542.3 million from $517.4 million.

Yelm: Fell 0.28 percent to $26.1 million from $26.18 million.”