Not always. Go to a dedicated board game store and you'll see such a wider variety than the branded Monopoly sets on sale at big box stores. Plus they usually have an area dedicated to actually playing games, something you'll never find at a chain. This community charm is paid for by the small store tax, but the benefits far outweigh the cost.
Stores like Target carry far more board games than just branded copies of Monopoly. Shit they sell Cards Against Humanity at Target. Barnes & Noble carries and even wider selection of board games and pen and paper role playing games. So big chains are definitely not limited to Monopoly.
While small game stores can carry a wider selection than big chains, most make their nut selling the bigger brand games or toys. There might be Black Swan stores able to specialize in Ticket to Ride or Carcasone expansions but that's not the common case.
I know the owners of quite a few small game stores. They are to a store struggling to keep the lights on because their costs are butting right up against their revenue. Charm is great and all but it doesn't pay the bills.
Again I'm not arguing against small shops but there's not much they offer above and beyond what can be found in big chains or online. The things they can offer, like a game play space, aren't easy or even possible to monetize.
That does not follow. Small stores carry the same shit as big chain stores. Because of their smaller scale and more limited purchasing power those items are more expensive than a chain and they can only afford to carry high throughput items. The only way small stores can deal with long tail items is if they're super specialty and neat a large enough metro area to have enough sales to survive.
I'm not saying small stores are bad but there's a decided small store tax. Without economies of scale they have a very hard time competing against chains. They have an even harder time competing against online sales.