Recent legislation is bound to weaken smaller outfits, already hurt by a sales slump, and make them takeover bait. とはどういう意味ですか?

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Actually, I'm not a 100% sure, but it could refer to an actual clothes lines or (more logically) an organization or company being hit by their own dwindling sales and then the actual government hurting them even more (more taxes or ordinances to follow), which, ultimately, forces them to go bancrupt or let someone else buy them out or, to put it more nicely, "take over" their line. If you change "outfits" to "outlets", it could actually refer to shopping centers being forced to give most, if not all, ownership to other businesses, which is happening alot in the US, many malls are starting to get close to bankruptcy. Again, not 100% sure, I took accounting not sales.