Looking at downtown, there are not a lot of places to shop. Most of downtown Carbondale consists of bar, restaurants, tattoo parlors and hair salons. There is Legal Smile at the south end of the Strip, Shawnee Trails, Jerry's Flower Shop, Insomnia cookies, a small clothing boutique above Traxx, the Printing Plant, Slabz, Old Town Liquors, Phoenix Cycles, Carbondale Cycle, Yesteryear tobacconists, Priority Sports, Consume, Town Square Market, Electric Larrys, La Unica, Castle Perilous Games and Books and Dona Camilla. What, if any, am I missing?
Pretty eclectic collection of shops, almost all of which will draw their own group of customers who will shop there and then leave. there is no moving from store to store looking for different items. Not sure how to fix it, given that the downtown landlords appear in no rush to fill the empty spaces.
Carbondale is Dead! Time to give it a decent burial.
ReplyDeleteDue to tax laws and the low prices many of those buildings were bought at decades ago, many owners (including the HOME one) have no incentive to lower their insane rent.
ReplyDeleteThose buildings wont get filled with shops until new owners buy them. I think thats slowly starting to happen but still a long ways to go.
A couple of retail consultants stopped by the store a few months ago. While talking they mentioned that, in many towns, it is the city council that is the impediment to new businesses moving into a downtown. In Carbondale, they found it was the downtown landlords that were the major problem.
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