We work in collaboration with thousands of local partners and grassroots leaders across the nation who share our commitment to advancing shared prosperity, creating resilient economies, and improving quality of life.
Made up of small towns, mid-sized communities, and urban commercial districts, the thousands of organizations, individuals, volunteers, and local leaders that make up Main Street America™ represent the broad diversity that makes this country so unique.
Looking for strategies and tools to support you in your work? Delve into the Main Street Resource Center and explore a wide range of resources including our extensive Knowledge Hub, professional development opportunities, field service offerings, advocacy support, and more!
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Pandemic Recovery Efforts in Georgia: Progress on the Georgia Main Street Innovation Grant Program
Left: Grassroots Coffee in Thomasville, Georgia receives a grant through the Main Street program's ecommerce matching grant program. Photo courtesy of Thomasville Main Street. Center: Maria Elias with her mural "Unidos," for the Athens Arts Alley. Photo courtesy of Athens DDA. Right
COVID-19 has posed significant challenges to Main Streets throughout the country, and the pandemic continues to test downtown districts today. To support Georgia Main Streets throughout the recovery process and position them for long-term sustainability, Main Street America launched the Georgia Main Street Innovation Grant Program, made possible through generous support from The Williams Family Foundation of Georgia.
The program provided five Georgia Main Street Programs $10,000 each last fall to help fund innovative revitalization efforts to address the current and/or legacy impacts of COVID-19. The program was open to all programs affiliated with Georgia Main Street that have an active Main Street America membership. From entrepreneur and small business support programs to marketing initiatives and placemaking projects, the winners used funds for creative and out-of-the-box ideas around COVID-recovery. Learn more about the winning ideas and their progress below.
Athens Downtown Development Authority: Athens Art Alley
Left: Maria Elias with her mural "Unidos." Center: A mural submission for the Athens Arts Alley. Right: Eli Saragoussi poses with her mural. Photos courtesy of Athens DDA
The Athens Art Alley is transforming a seldom-used, forgotten alley into an engaging, art-filled space that will encourage the community to come together. The Art Alley will attract people to the commercial district, bring attention to the creative economy, and provide desperately needed recovery assistance to local artists. The Athens Downtown Development Authority (DDA), in collaboration with their partners, the Athens Area Arts Council and the Lyndon House Arts Center, issued a call for mural submissions inspired by recovery, advocacy, activism, optimism, with a focus on recruiting BIPOC and LGBTQ+ artists. After receiving over 40 applications, seven artists were selected, with six of the artists identifying as BIPOC or LGBTQ+. The murals will be painted on panels that will be mounted to brick walls along the alley. Athens DDA expects to have the project completed by September of this year.
Downtown Development Authority of Tifton: The Yard
The Yard project will turn an underutilized downtown building on a sleepy street into a vibrant courtyard for food trucks to congregate and provide unique food choices for the community. Serving as a small business incubator, The Yard will help food truck operators expand into permanent locations downtown or provide an opportunity for existing downtown restaurants to launch a truck. Grant program funds are being used to create onsite handicap-accessible public restrooms, which will be crucial in a food courtyard development. So far, Tifton Downtown Development Authority has completed architectural renderings of the restrooms, applied for the permits for restroom construction, and completed general cleaning and maintenance. The Yard is currently hosting events and has rented small portable restrooms for the time being. The project is expected to be completed in mid-September.
City of Thomasville Main Street: E-Commerce Grant Program
Grassroots Coffee in Thomasville, Georgia receives a grant through the Main Street program's ecommerce matching grant program. Photo courtesy of Thomasville Main Street.
Throughout the pandemic, the biggest challenge reported by local businesses in Thomasville was creating and improving their online presence. TheCity of Thomasville Main Street program is hoping to address this challenge through an ecommerce matching grant program. The program will encourage business expansion and retention by investing in e-commerce as an additional revenue stream for their brick-and-mortar downtown business. Thomasville Main Street has marketed the opportunity to local businesses through their website, merchant meetings, city council, meetings, in-store discussions, and more. They have launched an application and are working with businesses to provide proper documentation to complete the application prior to the November 2021 deadline. Thomasville hopes to continue the project with additional funding, so they can continue to supporting their small businesses in ramping up their online presence.
Tybee Island Downtown Development Authority: Beach Business Bootcamp
Left: Seaside Sweets owner Rachel Jones and local news reporter Mariah Congedo during a SBDC site visit. Photo credit: Sarah Bernzott. Right: Kelly Swope (left), owner of Kelly and Company Essential Oil and SBDC instructor Nadia Osman during a site visit.
In a survey of their local small business owners, Tybee Island Downtown Development Authority (DDA) found that one of their top concerns was getting education to pivot their businesses for a post-pandemic world. Tybee Island has fulfilled this need for education with a pilot program to provide hands-on coaching to local business owners who need to flip their business plan for continued survival. Playing off their coastal location, the education program was called "Beach Business Bootcamp: Learn How to Flip Not Flop Your Business." In collaboration with the University of Georgia Small Business Development Center, Tybee Island DDA ran the bootcamp from April to August 2021. The virtual bootcamp was comprised of four modules, with opportunities for business to discuss challenges and share feedback, as well as an opportunity for the local SBDC trainer to visit each business and provide in-person counseling. Two training sessions per module helped local businesses expand their online presence and boost ecommerce capabilities. Twelve businesses completed the bootcamp, and participating businesses have seen a dramatic increases in social media engagement.
City of Valdosta: Beyond the Bricks - Downtown Business Storytelling Campaign
Downtown Valdosta created digital and video content to help drive shoppers into their brick-and-mortar businesses downtown, with a focus on the 2020 holiday shopping season. The videos told the stories of small business owners, appealed to the idea of shopping local, and captured how businesses were creating a safe shopping experience for the community. Over the past few months, Valdosta has been working with a video production company to help small businesses create additional videos capturing customers and community members explaining the importance of shopping local. Beyond the video campaigns, Valdosta started a downtown podcast called Beyond the Bricks, which highlights business owners and their stories and aims to bring positive attention to local small business owners.
In this video, learn more about the Williams’ family story, how the business is helping to revive downtown Helena, and the impact they’re having on a national level.
In honor of National Disaster Preparedness Month, we are providing some practical steps that Main Streets can take to prepare for the next, inevitable disaster.
Main Street America is leading a coalition urging that the EPA make available the GGRF funds for adaptive reuse and location-efficient projects because of the substantial greenhouse gas emissions reduction offered by such developments.
On May 9, the National Trust for Historic Preservation released its list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places for 2023 which included a cultural district located within a designated Main Street America community.
From 19th-century mill girls to Maine's mill redevelopments and the regional manufacturers of tomorrow, learn about the amazing history and promise of the New England mill.
This article was published on January 10, 2023, by Next City, a nonprofit news organization focused on socially, economically, and environmentally sustainable urban practices.
Learn how Rethos, the Coordinating partner for Minnesota Main Streets, has partnered with Reuse Minnesota and the Minnesota GreenCorps Program to encourage community-led preservation.
Main Street organizations and other public-private partnerships can provide the focal point needed to fulfill the large number of roles required to reuse or redevelop a house of worship in a way that benefits the community.
How do those amazing Main Street rehabilitation projects happen? And what policies and public support make them happen? In the Behind the Ribbon Cutting series, we look at a project or businesses from concept to opening day to break down the partnerships and funding brought to bear and recognize how we can advocate for policies and resources for revitalization across the country.
Main Street America welcomed the National Association For Latino Community Asset Builders (NALCAB) to our Twitter channel to share stories of resiliency in Latino communities.
We sat down with Lindsey Wallace, Director of Strategic Projects and Design Services and manager of the the National Park Service Main Street Community Disaster Preparedness and Resilience Program, to learn more about her perspective on disaster preparedness on Main Street.
The Association for Preservation Technology International (APT) Main Street Task Force is working to increase education, compile examples and data, and provide recommended changes at the national level where necessary.
In 2016, the North Carolina Main Street & Rural Planning Center partnered with the University of North Carolina at Greensboro’s Department of Interior Architecture (UNCG) to provide design assistance to Main Street communities.
In 2015, the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC) partnered with the University of Wisconsin–Madison to engage Wisconsin Main Street organizations and farmers markets in the Metrics and Indicators for Impact – Farmers Markets (MIFI-FM) toolkit.
With 413 National Park areas¹ and over 1,000 Main Street America programs, it’s no surprise that many of the communities following the Four Point Approach serve as gateways to our national parks.
We measure the effectiveness of our last marketing campaign, weigh whether the investment in new street lights outweigh the political capital spent, and debate if the thousands of volunteer hours are worth the impacts created by a one-day event.
Main Street Iowa, a program of the Iowa Economic Development Authority’s Iowa Downtown Resource Center, created a one-of-a-kind three-year program to provide help for performance venues located in Main Street districts.