Written by Lucie Steiner Friday, 14 October 2011
When taking a short walk down Broadway to Neperan Road in Tarrytown, one will encounter seven vacant storefronts, accounting for over 17,000 square feet of unoccupied retail space. The spaces for rent include the former Tarrytown Gourmet, which was sixteen years old when it closed its doors in June of 2011. The former Tarrytown Pharmacy was a kind of successor to Russell and Laurie’s Pharmacy, which was established in 1894, and had been on North Broadway, in one form or another, for over a hundred years. It sparks an eerie feeling to see how a staple of small business, like the local pharmacy, which witnessed the turn of the century, survived the great depression, and saw the evolution of modern medicine, can so easily vanish.
Why are so many business owners along Broadway calling it quits? For many storeowners, the primary obstacle to doing business seems to be the high cost of property. “What I’ve heard is that everybody’s rent is going way up,” says Elise Goldschlag, owner of the Flying Fingers Yarn Shop. Another possibility is the inability to compete with larger businesses in the area. A sign posted on the door of 59 Broadway (the Tarrytown Pharmacy’s old location) directs former clients to pick their prescriptions up from CVS two stores down the street. Whatever the reason, these empty windows are a reminder that the recession, which never materially left, may be back.
Despite the growing number of vacancies, local business owners in Tarrytown are staying positive. “Businesses rise or fall according to the energy of the leader,” says Paul Bessolo, owner of Rock Island Sound, the local guitar store. Bessolo’s Tarrytown branch of the store has been open for only a year, but he has another store in Rye that has been open for seven. He remembers when he first opened the Rye location, handling the burden of running a business alone; “In the beginning it was just me. I was teaching, accounting, answering the phones, talking to the customers, talking to insurance agents…It’s a lot for one person. That’s why I have multiple personalities,” he jokes. When I asked him how he decided to open a new store in such challenging economic conditions, his answer was simple: “You either expand or die,” he said. “Besides, when the economy’s no good, that’s when you get the best deals.”
Goldschlag has a more experimental way of expanding the reach of her business, which came to Tarrytown five years ago. Her official Flying Fingers bus picks up patrons in the city and brings them to Tarrytown for shopping trips. “When the economy tanked we started going to fiber conventions. We take our show on the road. This summer we went to Chicago.” When I asked her what her advice would be to a person wishing to open a business during an economic downturn she said, “Do what you love. The way I look at it, if my store bellies up, all that yarn is mine. I bought it, so it better be stuff I love.”
Henry Cabral, owner of the Tarry Tavern, could be said to represent both old and new. He is the son of Fernando Cabral, the owner of Caravela, which has been has been in business for twenty-five years. The Tarry Tavern, which is about a year old, is the younger Cabral’s new venture. When I asked him about his experience opening a new business during a time of economic stress he said, “business for the first year has been better than expected.” This may have something to do with Cabral’s philosophy toward the restaurant business, which he inherited while he was working for fine dining restaurants, both in Westchester and in Manhattan. The two principals for Cabral are “sense of urgency” and “finesse”— that is, being constantly on your toes without sharing any of that stress with the customer.
For all these businesses, location is key, and all three storeowners made a point of mentioning their symbiotic relationship with the Tarrytown Music Hall. Goldschlag’s Flying Fingers rents from the Music Hall, and Goldschlag says they have been very generous landlords. “We’re really lucky to have our warehouse,” she says. “That’s what we call it. Everyone else calls it ‘the studio apartment above the marquee.’” Bessolo attributes much of his store’s success to the “foot traffic” of Main Street, and Cabral says, “Tarrytown is a big draw for tourists. We love the Music Hall. That’s a big draw.”
Bessolo and Goldschlag both emphasize a strong involvement with the local community as a secret to success. Rock Island Sound provides over a hundred afterschool programs to schools in the Westchester area. When I visited Flying Fingers for my interview with Goldschlag, she was hosting a knitting class for some of her patrons. The participants are invited to stay, not only for the lesson, but for as long as the store is open. “It’s kind of a Coffee Labs for fiberholics,” says Goldschlag.
Small business owners in Tarrytown acknowledge that times are tough, but with the help of a loyal clientele, they remain optimistic. Goldschlag keeps in mind the lessons she learned from growing up in a retail family. “I was always taught that it’s a cycle. It might be a longer cycle this time, but I think business will come back.”
