Business does not thrive by chance

Someone commmented my  reference to North Bay was from thirty years.ago. You will notice as you grow older how fast the years run into each other. North Bay may have changed.

It's been some years since indoor malls have stopped being built. Many towns never had a mall.

I drive to Collingaood  a few weeks ago. Passed through  many towns on, the way. Main Streets are as they always were with chains  and privately operated business side by side.

Picton  for one. I  always look for the local bakery. In my seaside home town,there were more bakeries, sweetie shops , Italian ice cream parlours and fish and chip shops than anything else.

But the story I remember from North Bay was , how a privately operated  dress shop differed
from  a mall chain store.

First the store owner-operator knew. her customers personally. When she went to the seasonal and annual wholesale shows, she shopped for her customers. And when the shipment arrived  customers would receive a call from the dress shop telling them ; "I have something that is you"

I don't know if that was true of every store. But it certinly sounds plausible and N extraordinary level of service. No mall chain store buyer could compete with that.

But indoor malls  haven't been the norm for some years. Can't say I've noticed how many exactly.
Certainly Canada Mall had it's ups and downs , and many changes. It put the kibosh on many small
business in Aurora. Shopping in the mal was n expedition for the family. It also proved too expensive  for  store operators and the crowds in the heat if summer or depth of winter were not necessarily
shoppers.I have heard of business allowed to stay though they couldn't pay the rent because the mall couldn't afford to have empty stores.

That's plausible too.

But things change even in small towns as so many people younger than I are fond of telling me.

Gas and  car insurance costs are heavy. Condominiums outpace single family homes. Families
are smaller or non-existent.

For forty  years, the town has known, downtown would  recover unless  people returned to live in the centre of things.

It has been happening for the past fifteen years. North and south of the centre block.Dozens of new business  thriving in new buildings  built to blend .And done so well it's my hard to tell.

Some  have not succeeded . Maybe because they did not study the market. Or didn't have enough financialbacking to see them through.We also know operating a smal business has never been easy at any time. They need all the help the town can provide.

We spend enough.  But I am not convinced we spend it well. I  don't believe the strategic plan is helpful. The  Promenade Study ,while proposing  millions in spending proposes also propose controls
that  could only be conceived by politicians made mad by power.

A  town department's function is described  as "retention and expansion "

I tell you ,without a hint of a lie, I have never seen  any effort whatsoever in that direction.

Unless of course we are talking about spending millions on real estate for a crazy heritage theme park
Or millions more in a giveaway to establish  a university satellite within our midst.

Like all we need to do is throw money at these things and something is bound to happen.