[Vision2020] Businesses come and businesses go -- so?
Joan Opyr
joanopyr at earthlink.net
Mon Jul 11 13:33:26 PDT 2005
Phil takes as evidence of downtown Moscow's ill health that some
businesses have closed. As any MBA will tell you, four out of five
small businesses fail within the first five years; the statistics are
even worse for restaurants. The point I would emphasize is not that
four out of five small businesses fail, but that one out of five
succeed. If we ensure that our Central Business District remains
retail, parking, and pedestrian-friendly, then new businesses will
continue to come and take the place of the old and the unsuccessful.
I shop downtown quite a bit, and I have not noticed any significant
amount of retail space sitting empty and decrepit. It is far from
depressing to walk down Main Street from Third to Sixth. In fact, it's
quite cheerful -- and instructive. Stop at Hodgins and the Guitar's
Friend. Get a cup of coffee at Zumé. (Yes, Zumé. I recommend
supporting the only currently legal use of the historic Skattaboe
Building. Perhaps it will encourage Doug Wilson to stop thinking "This
is my Oxford" and start thinking "Central Business District.") Have
lunch at the Casa or the Breakfast Club or the Old Peking. Shop at the
Goodwill. Soon, you'll also be able to shop at the Moscow Food Co-Op
-- its opening will be a sure and certain boon to downtown retail.
Paradise Creek Bicycles, The Abode (a great new store selling hemp
clothing, recycled stationery, natural paints and other non-toxic
household products), Bookpeople, Mikey's, Moscow Pawn, Tie-Dye
Everything, Wheatberries, a styling salon, and Sweet Streak Lingerie
are all open and friendly and ready for business. Phil might feel that
he's walking through a morgue, but I'd suggest that's because he's
wearing his death-colored glasses. If he were to stop for a
double-shot mocha at every coffee shop from Zumé to One World, perhaps
he might perk up a bit and see what was really before him rather than
the parade of retail corpses he seems to prefer.
If Phil really wants to learn something about business failure and
empty retail space, he should pay a visit to the Palouse Empire Mall.
The old Emporium location seems to be cursed, as does the corner store
once owned by the Nature Sport. Businesses in those spaces seem to
open and close with great regularity. Of course, the fact that one can
smell sheep and cow manure within the mall does tend to diminish the
high-end retail experience. Fine clothes, fine dining, and the fine
smell of the city's "turd twirler" at the sewage treatment plant across
the highway are perhaps not a recipe for retail success. (And yet all
the mall management can seem to think about is cutting down the trees
along the highway, which, if left to grow, might help filter some of
that unpleasant odor. Please, stop with the chain-saws and the
bull-dozers. How about planting a few hardy Magnolias?)
Nope. You can keep the Palouse Empire Mall. Give me downtown
shopping, with the occasional catalog supplement and a trip to glorious
Tri-State, truly "Idaho's Most Interesting Store."
Joan Opyr/Auntie Establishment
www.auntie-establishment.com
PS: If Phil is so deeply concerned about my becoming a media
conglomerate (because Brother Carl and I have a two-hour, low-wattage,
unfair and unbalanced Sunday radio show on KRFP Moscow) then I suggest
that he stop whining and do something about it, like making an effort
to get his own views on the air. KRFP is *always* advertising for DJs.
Phil need only drop by the station or email Leigh Robartes
(leigh at krfp.org) and apply for his own show. He can then devote two
hours a week of his own time to playing Grateful Dead albums and
telling everyone within range (on a good day, that's Steakhouse Hill to
Risenaeur) exactly what he thinks about whatever subject catches his
fancy. Judaism, kaolin mining, Budweiser versus Miller Lite . . . no
one except the FCC will make any attempt to censor him. Of course,
Phil can't make people listen to him anymore than Brother Carl or I
can; it's up to him to make some effort to be entertaining. But that's
his problem. Perhaps if he expanded his repertoire, added The Doors or
some early Pink Floyd, and spoke coherently and evinced some evidence
of a sense of humor or a genuine love and concern for Moscow, then he
might find that "The Phil Nisbet Kaolin Mining Grateful Dead Comedy
Hour" was a great success.
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