Downtown Rutland retailers report happy holidays

Article originally published as “Downtown Rutland retailers report happy holidays” by Gordon Dritschilo

January 4, 2024

Rutland Herald

Downtown retailers said they had a merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

Calista Budrow at GreenSpell Plant Shop on Center Street said the store’s third December was a record-breaking month.

“The holidays are always really good around here,” she said. Even the week after Christmas was great — a lot of people downtown, bringing family downtown.”

For the most part, other downtown merchants sounded similar notes when visited Wednesday. The truest tale will be told by receipts for the city’s 1% sales tax, but City Treasurer Mary Markowski said those numbers won’t be available until the end of the month, and that she didn’t have the sort of data that would make her comfortable offering projections.

Just up the street from GreenSpell, Logan Paluch at Wild Kind Toys said it was a strong season for her, though she does not have the history downtown that some of her neighbors do.

“People are still discovering us, which is fun,” she said. “We still feel kind of like a new kid on the block. It felt like a long holiday season with Thanksgiving being a little early.”

Nearby, Bookmobile owner Donald Babcock was somewhat less enthusiastic than his neighbors, saying the season had been a normal one for him.

“I could say better than last year, which was disastrous,” he said. “It’s pretty much the same, which is not good.”

Babcock said he was worried about the coming year as well.

“The parking (fees) going up is going to hurt,” he said. “People have already complained about that.”

Down the block, Mountain Music owner Meshach Tourigny said December had gone very well, with new albums by Taylor Swift and Noah Kahan flying out the door.

“This was our best one since we came downtown,” he said. “The economy seems surprisingly strong. There wasn’t much discretion in spending. I’ve done a lot of Christmases and this was a nice, strong steady one.”

Next door at Diamonds and More, Ivan Rochon said his engagement ring business had grown steadily during a landmark December.

“It was the second-best Christmas we ever had, and we missed the first by dollars,” he said. “We advertised a lot, and we worked a lot of hours.”

At McNeil & Reedy, Casey McNeil said thick flannel shirts and cardigans had sold particularly well and that he was thankful for the Downtown Rutland Partnership’s efforts through the holidays.

“It brought a lot of new people in the shop,” he said

Paluch said the DRP’s Jingle Bell Shop promotion helped.

“Those events are always great for getting people downtown,” she said. “We’re grateful to the partnership for being able to pull that off. ... Killington World Cup Thanksgiving weekend always sends some people this way.

A few people said Killington seemed to be driving more traffic than usual to the downtown in December.

“I think there being less snow encouraged a lot of people to come downtown instead of being up at Killington,” said GreenSpell employee Madison Bourassa.

Budrow noted that a number of businesses expanded hours slightly. Paluch said Center Street being more occupied than in the recent past contributed as well.

“People coming down here for one store they know about are likely to find others,” she said. “Having Speakeasy (Café) here has been huge for us.” Earlier this year, the popular downtown coffee shop relocated to new space in the same building as Wild Kind.

People weren’t just coming downtown to shop, either. Alderman Joe Barbagallo reported on Tuesday during the Board of Aldermen’s first meeting of the year that on two days last week, Wonderfeet Kids’ Museum had to turn people away because it was filled to capacity.

“To quote an old movie, ‘If you build it, they will come,’” Barbagallo said. “They are coming. We need to see more of this in the city.”

gordon.dritschilo