Here’s why shared retail and shed incubators work now

ByBecky McCray

Whether you divide up one big building into lots of small retailers or you stack up some sheds to build a tiny business incubator, I love shared retail spaces. They generate prosperity for rural areas and small towns when they:

  • give small business ideas an affordable foothold
  • create experiences that draw customers in
  • build on the element of discovery for customers
  • test promising concepts
  • shelter smaller businesses than could otherwise survive
  • fill gaps in local retail markets
  • boost cooperation and innovation among local retailers

Reporter Rebecca Logan spoke with merchants at shared spaces in Pennsylvania for an upcoming article for LNP. The vendors she talked to said they go out of their way to help each other.

Then Rebecca asked me whether the COVID19 pandemic changed all that. Has ecommerce killed rural retail collectives?

NO. 

I have four stories of shared retail that have opened right before or since the beginning of the pandemic. 

And three are stories I haven’t told you before. 

Uncover the details and see the pics at SmallBizSurvival.

Keep shaping a better future for your town,

Becky 

PS – Wish your local businesses would go out of their way to help each other? Check out our new video, Get Local Businesses on Board.