Renee Changnon, Assistant Editor Hardware Retailing Magazine, and Tara Mazzarella of Independent We Stand

Independent We Stand Road Trip Centers On Main Street

In communities across the country, hardworking business owners and buy local advocates come together to foster an organized effort to reinvent and revitalize Main Streets and downtown districts. Independent We Stand profiles the work that these groups do and promotes the events they put on.

This summer, the team set out on a weeklong road trip to visit America’s Main Streets in person and connect with the people who sustain them in a more meaningful way. During the “Main Streets Make Us Better Road Trip,” the team traveled more than 2,000 miles, stopping in 22 cities and conducting 40 interviews with Main Street heroes along the way.

The goal of the trip was to eat, sleep, play and shop 100-percent locally. That even included finding independently owned gas stations — the most challenging (but still not impossible) part of the trip by far. The team stopped in large, metropolitan areas like Detroit and Boston, as well as smaller communities like Rochester, Michigan, and Montclair, New Jersey. At each stop, we interviewed small business owners, Main Street directors and buy local advocates to get a deeper understanding of the community and to create content that we can use to share this deeper understanding with the public.

Kristi Trevarrow - Executive Director Downtown Rochester

Downtown Rochester Wants To Help People Make Memories

Located just outside the Detroit metro area, Rochester, Michigan, swaps the hustle and bustle of the city with a familiar hometown vibe. Downtown Rochester is home to more than 350 shops, restaurants and service businesses, 85 percent of which are independently owned. Relying on the National Main Street Center’s Four-Point Approach®, the Rochester Downtown Development Authority (DDA) helps these businesses grow, in order to enhance the quality of life for local residents and to help them make long-lasting memories in this special place.

“When people support their Main Streets, it’s all about places and place making,” said Kristi Trevarrow, executive director of the Rochester DDA. “It’s a place that they want to raise their children and make memories that are going to last a lifetime —you can’t do that anywhere but down on Main Street.”
 
Trevarrow admitted that the buy local message seems to have been “watered down” over the years, but the significance is still there, and groups like Independent We Stand and the National Main Street Center have helped along the way.

“We started our organization back in 1983, but we really got traction back in 2000 when we joined the National Main Street Center,” she said.

Cleveland Main Street Groups Make Big Neighborhoods Feel Small

An innovative program in the big city of Cleveland attempts to make room for the small. The Small Box program turns old shipping containers into retail spaces for start-up small businesses and gets them near the big action of downtown without the big price tag of downtown rent. It’s a perfect example of the creative ways that Main Street groups add value for their businesses and their communities.

“Small Box is a wonderful creative project that we started because we were having trouble finding retail spaces for local businesses,” said Tom Starinsky, associate director of the Historic Warehouse District Development Corporation, which launched the Small Box program with Cleveland Container Structures last year. “We borrowed the idea of converting shipping containers into retail spaces from other cities, and we were able to create it through a crowd-funding campaign, where we raised enough money to do three boxes.”

The first three stores opened last fall, and the team is currently fundraising to open four more boxes. The Warehouse District is Cleveland’s oldest commercial neighborhood, and its development corporation is just one of the Main Street groups working to support local businesses throughout the city.

There’s also the Historic Gateway District, which is known for its local entertainment. Starinsky is also the associate director of the Historic Gateway Neighborhood Corporation.

From left to right: Ben Johnson - Owner Blarney Stone Pub, Shane Laquercia - Fields Corner resident and fan, and Lee Adelson - Board President of Fields Corner Main Street Tom Starinsky - Associate Director Historic Warehouse District & Historic Gateway District

Montclair Center Overcomes Historical Challenges to Become Award-Winning Main Street
If the name Montclair Center sounds familiar, it’s probably because the New Jersey community’s Main Street group recently won a 2015 Great American Main Street Award from the National Main Street Center. Independent We Stand stopped by the Montclair Center Business Improvement District (BID) to see what makes this downtown district stand out. As it turns out, the community has faced many of the same challenges that communities and Main Streets across the country have faced in past decades, but it has rallied to produce a remarkable transformation.

“Our real challenges came in the ‘70s and ‘80s, when both the customers and the businesses flew to the malls,” said Luther Flurry, executive director of the Montclair Center BID. “We hit our nadir around 1990, when most the downtown was underutilized and/or vacant.”

Organizing and leveraging the buy local movement has helped lift Montclair Center to the bustling, artsy scene it is today. As such, it’s a draw for residents, Big Apple commuters and tourists.

“Fifty years ago, if you had a local store, if you built it, people would come,” Flurry said. “Today merchants need to know how to compete with the big boys, and the buy local campaigns, several of them have wonderful business support components that help the independent merchant know how to attract and retain their local customers.”

Independent We Stand Celebrates Main Street Success With Big Support

Success stories like these snapshots from the road trip drive Independent We Stand to continue growing the buy local movement. Sometimes, it’s a single program that brings hope to small businesses in a given community. Other times, it’s a tradition of organizing and working together that makes the difference. Either way, Independent We Stand seeks out these stories and tells them proudly.

This work wouldn’t be possible without equally hardworking sponsors and partners, including the National Main Street Center. The Independent We Stand movement is sponsored by big names like STIHL Inc., Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, PPG Pittsburgh Paints and Tire Pros. In working with these brands, Independent We Stand showcases how small businesses can produce big results and enhance the way of life for people in their communities.

To effectively connect Main Streets and their businesses with supporters in the community, Independent We Stand has a number of tools for both business owners and consumers. Discover new independent businesses on your Main Street with the Independent We Stand free mobile app for iOS and Android devices. Like the online local business search engine, the mobile app lets you find local businesses on the go, wherever you are. Follow the Independent We Stand blog for the latest news and stories about Main Streets across the country.

Bill Brunelle is the co-founder of Independent We Stand. Independent We Stand is a cause marketing campaign and its mission is to educate consumers about the importance and strong economic benefits of supporting locally owned businesses.