In reply to PaulW:
Compared to a lot of other categories, shoes have relatively low margins and you need a lot of pairs on stock to sell a single pair - and I suspect this goes doubly for trekking, climbing and mountaineering footwear where much of the manufacturing is still done by hand and close to home.
It would suck for the consumer mostly, given they would have to travel farther to get a decent selection. But from a retail perspective it's quite hard to actually make a profit selling outdoor footwear. Unless you have literally everything, hence the proliferation of brand stores and big box retail.