CINCINNATI — Several businesses in the Anderson and Mount Washington neighborhoods are shutting down because there aren’t enough customers supporting them.
Some businesses are pivoting to stay alive and others are on the brink of moving. The Tome Bookstore is a local coffee shop in the center of Mount Washington. Thousands of people drive by it each day. But owner Jeremy Spencer said that if people don’t start coming in, they’re moving out.
“We love Mount Washington so much, we love this business district, it’s beautiful and we do have close ties to a lot of people in the community and ultimately we would love to stay here,” Spencer said.
But Spencer said after appealing to the community on Facebook, he’s gotten offers from places like Clifton, Covington and Loveland to bring his coffee shop elsewhere. But he’s not ready to pull the plug just yet and has seen a turn in business.
“The outpouring of love and support and things have began to pickup here and we are super grateful for that,” Spencer said. “But we just want to make sure it continues so that we ultimately can stay here.”
Jeremy shared that as a writer, owning a bookstore is a dream. He and his wife put about $80,000 of their own money into the business, so everything is riding on it. And he said it’s scary watching other businesses shut down.
“If a place that’s been in this community for six years is having trouble getting foot traffic and getting people to come in, how will we fair in the next year or two or three?”
Just a block away, Sweets and Meats has been forced to pivot to stay alive. The popular BBQ join started in 2014 and opened a brick and mortar in 2017.
“I grew up in Mount Washington, I’ve lived here for 42 years, my mom helped me start the business,” owner Kristen Bailey said.
But Bailey was forced to close her brick and mortar carry-out business in December.
“I had to look at it from the angle, if I was advising a client, what would I do,” she said. “I’d tell them to stop the bleeding. And the way to stop the bleeding is not to put a band-aid on it and that’s what we’ve been doing for several years.”
Bailey said only 14% of her business came from carry-out and there was too much waste each night. So she’s doubled down on just the catering side.
“We launched a new division this year called ‘All Occasions Catering’ so with that umbrella we actually now do lunch, dinner and breakfast, we also do appetizers. We’ve expanded the menu into doing tacos, Italian food, Asian fare,” Bailey said.
Sometimes it’s all about the pivot. We once featured Harrison and Kasy Bird’s pivot too. They turned their Anderson Township daycare into an ice cream shop, Bird’s Sweets and Treats. But a Facebook post earlier in this month shared that they ran out of options to keep the business going.
Just down the street in Anderson, another business gone. Ryan and Ashley O’Neill owned Stellar Street Eats. We featured their truck as they were opening a brick and mortar. Both the building and their food truck are now up for sale. Bailey recognized their struggle.
“I hate to admit this, but I do feel like if we were in a different area, a different market, we would probably be much more successful or grown at a larger capacity than we already have.”
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