By Bob Seidenberg
With Northwestern students now back filling downtown streets, alums and out-of-towners alike eager to gawk at the university’s new $875 million stadium, and picture-perfect weather to match, City officials could have hardly found a better time to launch their new retail incubator and pop-up program, ‘Space to Place’ than last week.
Claire Seizovic, a retail activation specialist, who first came to to the city with the idea for the program, said she wasn’t initially aware the opening of the initiative would coincide with those events.
”I was just like, oh, this will be October, and now everyone’s here,” she said, standing in Bookman’s Alley, where the program is being held. “There’s so many alums. There’s also the planning conference [the American Planning Association-Illinois Chapter], so we’ve had planners from everywhere.”
The program is designed to give small businesses a low-risk way to test their ideas in a brick-and-mortar format. Most of the pop-up businesses occupy 100 square-feet space in the building, located down the alley from the 1700 block of Sherman Ave.
A second goal is activating empty storefronts in Evanston, she said. While Bookman’s Alley is not street-facing, the program’s goal is to have the businesses expand into stand-alone status, she said. The program provides for city-backed marketing support and other services.
“This is our chance to really start to develop homegrown retail,” said Paul Zalmezak, the city’s Economic Development Manager, when the program was first presented earlier this year.
“You don’t have to go to other communities to get retail to come here or try to get a broker to bring a national retailer. You can start that here.” Zalmezak said then.
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The city first sent out word about the program in a survey, receiving over 100 responses, Seizovic said.
Eventually, 38 people applied; 32 of those were found eligible, and 11 selected, she said.
Samantha Aguilar, the Evanston owner of Bloom & Threshold, was one of them.
Working for a tech startup, Aguilar left that business about a year ago, “working for myself,” she said, “and I really wanted to translate that into something for myself. And wreath making has always been my favorite hobby, and I thought, ‘Why not try that one?’”
”So I’ve been running an online business for a year and doing lots of custom orders and things like that in the local area, but this is my first time selling in person,” she said of the Bookman’s Alley project, “and I’m super excited to be here.”
The opportunity allows her to showcase the work of other wreath makers too, she said.
Steve Rogin, the owner of the Bookman Alley’s property and successful developer of the Varsity Theater mixed-use development across the way, was more than happy to make the property available for the city’s temporary use.
”I grew up in an entrepreneurial family and if I’m able to help someone put their toe in the water to be an entrepreneur in a way that that limits their risk and doesn’t put me at risk I’m more than happy to help,” he said.
Support from the city is an integral part of the program. Each participating business has a dedicated retail footprint within Bookman Alley’s shared 3,000-square-foot marketplace, along with a shared point-of-sale system, business training and mentorship, City marketing support, and access to an expert roster covering licensing, brand strategy, financial planning, and lease negotiation, officials said in their release.
In place of fixed rent, participants pay a low monthly fee plus a percentage of sales, officials explained. “The program is designed as a pathway toward permanent commercial tenancy, helping businesses build the sales history, customer base, and confidence to take on a storefront of their own.”
Seizovic moved back to the area about a year and a half ago after serving as a development manager for similar adaptive reuse projects for towns in Massachusetts and Arizona.
She came to local officials with the idea for the program after managing a successful holiday market event in the vacant Bookman’s Alley space behind 1712 Sherman Ave., during the holiday season last year. That market brought together 16 independent businesses and drew more than 100 attendees.
The first Space to Place cohort, officials said in their released RELEASE, includes 13 Evanston-based businesses offering home objects, furniture, art, jewelry, paper goods, provisions, and more: Bloom & Threshold, El Molcajete Sauces, Furniture Picnic, glimmr, Laurie Kwo Art, Little Rooms by Little Gems, MisTeaques, OOFIE, Suzie Teas Cookies, Swantiques, and The Dandy Shop.
The new small business retail incubator and pop-up program will be open Wednesday through Sunday, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., through December 31.
Admission is free. The opening weekend celebration was sponsored in part by Downtown Evanston.