[OMS_MANAGERS] Downtown Update - May 2023 Newsletter

[La Grande Main Street Downtown]

May 2023 Newsletter LA GRANDE MAIN STREET DOWNTOWN About Us Support Our Mission Hello OMS, Spring is well underway and this April, La Grande Main Street Downtown tidied up downtown and held a Spring Spree. In May, we are looking forward to hosting Women in Business, sponsored by Soroptimist International of La Grande, on May 23rd. Registration required, click HERE NOTES FROM MONICA - Executive Director April was a busy, but wonderful month! We had our downtown clean up brought to you by our Outreach Committee, with so many wonderful members of the community and the EOU Football team. Downtown looks sparkly clean, with new shrubs in some of the planters. I traveled to West Linn for an all Oregon Main Street conference about the new standards from National Main Street. I loved meeting new directors, and seeing ones I've met before, as well as learn about the new accreditation from a National Main Street representative. We are so lucky to have such wonderful colleagues that help us brain storm, problem solve, and celebrate our little victories! We are honored to be asked to host the next All Oregon Main Street Conference here in downtown La Grande in July. Main Street Directors from all over Oregon will join our State Coordinator for a fun couple days of networking, learning, and growing. I am even going to present on social media to the group! Next up we had the spring open house, the Spring spree! How delightful to see so many community members out supporting our local retailers! With 23 businesses on our Spring Spree passport, we were excited to see new retailers participating in a downtown shopping event. In May, we are so thrilled to be hosting the inaugural Women in Business Quarterly Symposium, sponsored by Soroptimist of La Grande! What a great opportunity for the women business owners and entrepreneurs to get together and brainstorm ways to help with the downtown shop local initiative, as well as support each others businesses!   NEOEDD and La Grande Main Street Downtown are presenting the Destination Creation course featuring videos of Jon Schallert and recorded author interviews. Jon Schallert is a well-regarded professional speaker who teaches businesses and communities how to turn themselves into Consumer Destinations. He developed his proprietary "Destination Business" process after interviewing over 10,000 independent business owners in nearly 600 cities, towns, and downtowns. Lisa Dawson, certified Destination Creation course instructor, will be facilitating this workshop. This is a six-session workshop series and will be held in La Grande in La Grande Main Street Downtown's conference room (102 Depot Street) on Tuesday mornings from 8-10 a.m. starting May 9th. The final session will be June 20th. There won't be a session on May 30th. The regular price for the course is $799. Residents of Union, Baker, and Wallowa counties can sign up and pay $199 now and receive $199 back after attending the entire series (with no more than one excused absence) and submitting a one-page plan for implementing new actions to improve their business. Monica says" I saw Jon as a speaker at the Main Street National Convention in Boston, and he had some really good tips and tricks to promote your business and raise sales, making your store a destination to bring people in from out of town. There were things he said that I had not thought about and it really got the wheels turning. I highly recommend it! Best part--it is free if you complete the 6 days of the workshop. It starts Tuesday May 9th at 8am and registration closes Monday May 8th at 5pm." For more information and to register: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSduX2f5ARtqryX85DpaeSq56kN8_C_P5N5m1pzawiAjdqSvjQ/viewform   We've been moving and shaking, and working hard for our community! We are so lucky to live in a delightful town. It is the passion of not only our staff, but of our volunteers that make this organization great! April Events Downtown Cleanup Day   La Grande is a lot more sparkly after LGMSD’s Downtown Cleanup Day. A legion of volunteers (and the EOU Football Team), headed up by Nicole Felty, chair of the Outreach Committee, armed with squeegees, trowels, and other cleaning/gardening implements, spent Earth Day from 9 AM to noon making La Grande lovely for the advent of spring. They washed windows, cleaned out tree wells, spiffed up sidewalks, and weeded extraneous areas. Our Design Committee tidied up Reynolds Park, Downtown La Grande’s very own pocket park. Downtown La Grande certainly looks grand now! ·       Alpine Archery and Fly ·       Blue Mountain Outfitters ·       Bugs and Butterflies ·       Clanktronix/The Archives ·       Direct Music Source ·       Faerie Beads ·       Hobby Habit ·       La Grande Paint and Glass ·       Bout Time Boutique ·       Real Deals – La Grande ·       Rosewood Cottage ·       Savage Serpents ·       The Local ·       The Marketplace Underground Boutiques  Spring Spree   Brought to you by our Shop Local Sub Committee, the reports are coming in…a grand time was had by all. The Passports were filled up with stickers and folks shopped, if not until they dropped, at least making a notable contribution to the commerce of La Grande on Saturday, April 29th.  Many people patronized businesses they haven't been into before. Intrepid shoppers have been returning their Passports to our office for participation in the Monday, May 8th drawing for gift cards and prizes from these valued merchants:   Thanks to our Renewing Partners  We would like to thank our renewing members (the first couple of a long list): Scott's Heating and Air Globe Furniture Tap That! Growlers Mountain Works Bicycles RE/MAX Rea; Estate Team Fitzgerald Flowers MJ Goss Motors Sorbonets Thank you so much for helping to make Downtown La Grande vibrant, stable, and beautiful! Eastern Oregon Beer Fest We have a new Eastern Oregon Beer Fest committee working hard to put on a great event for our region! Lots of local vendors, food trucks, beer and cider are on tap for a wonderful day at the Union County Fair Grounds! Tickets are on sale now, available HERE Our events calender is located HERE BIG EVENTS WORKSHOP   La Grande Main Street is hosting a quick hour-long workshop on upcoming Big Events and how retailers can optimize their consumers' experiences, leaving a better brand impression to keep customers coming back. Please have someone from your place of business available to attend. This will be held either in the second half of May or first half of June (before Touch-A-Truck). We want to make these events the best yet, highlighting our wonderful local businesses. When we work together, we can make these events great!  Fill out this quick survey HERE on what the best time for this would be We are looking forward to these upcoming BIG EVENTS:   Touch - A - Truck - June 10th (11am-1pm) Crazy Days- July 14th and 15th Eastern Oregon Beer Festival - August 19th Community Harvest Festival - October 7th We're always looking for volunteers! There's something for everyone with our different committees. Give back to your community through work in one of our main committees (Promotion, Design, Economic Vitality, or Outreach) or help downtown clean up, or event a specific event! Click HERE to see all the different opportunities COMMITTEE REPORTS   Promotions Committee   April has been a month of planning for the Promotions Committee. By the time this comes out, the Spring Spree will be in the books! Lots of fun and opportunities for great deals at our local stores with the chance to win prizes by filling out your Spring Spree Passport with stickers and turning it in. Our downtown is so beautiful (especially after last weekend’s Downtown Cleanup Day) that it’s a shame to not take advantage of all of the great things happening! Be sure to stay tuned to our Facebook page for information on our upcoming Women in Business evening mixer to be held on May 23rd. It will be a wonderful opportunity to visit and relax and make some great connections. Be ready for some fun updates to Crazy Days, as well as the return of some fun happenings that weekend! If you think that what we are doing sounds like a fun thing to be involved in, we are always looking for volunteers to help out with our events, so don’t hesitate to reach out!   Design Committee   The Design Committee has been busy finalizing details and fundraising for our downtown hanging flower baskets. Union FFA is growing the flowers and we are very excited to show off the work of these hard-working students with locally- sourced blooms! We are coordinating with the Eastern Oregon University Men’s Wrestling team to hang the baskets in late May. Additional topics at this month’s meeting included discussion about current and future façade grant applications. The committee reviewed an application submitted by Eric Laurence to update/replace second-story windows on his building. The group is actively seeking more potential applicants to apply for façade grants, and we are excited about the interest we have received from prominent Adams Avenue businesses. We are continuing to gather ideas for a geocaching project to feature downtown waypoints. Our focus thus far has been on obtaining a list of ghost signs for our initial project. We hope to have this nailed down to unveil this summer. Our group coordinated a clean-up of Reynolds Pocket Park that happened in conjunction with the downtown clean-up on April 22. We are pleased with everyone’s commitment to bettering our beautiful downtown. Outreach Committee  We extend our sincere thanks to everyone who participated in the Downtown Clean Up Day we held on Earth Day last month. Your hard work and dedication made the event a success and helped to keep our community clean and beautiful. We truly appreciate your continued support in these efforts! Looking ahead, we are excited to announce that we have an all-organization training scheduled for next week with the State Coordinator from Oregon Main Street. This training will provide an opportunity for us to further develop our skills and knowledge in serving our community. We are looking forward to the valuable insights and learning that will come out of this training. Additionally, we are excited to be bringing back our Community Town Halls in late June. This will be a great opportunity for us to come together as a community, share ideas and feedback, and collaborate on initiatives that will help to make our town a better place to live and work. We will share more details about these events in the coming weeks! Economic Vitality Committee  The EV Committee met in April, having conducted a focus group with downtown outdoor recreation retailers. We are working to schedule our next focus group with downtown restaurants sometime in May. The committee is also working to compile a list of downtown vacancies. Beer Fest Committee   The Beer Fest Committee is moving forward at a steady pace. We have solidified the catering and venue for the VIP party. We have a commitment from Jerry for safe rides for the VIP party and day of event. We also brought on a new marketing person and we are looking forward to creating videos and ads for all social media outlets. The team has pulled together for our commitment to our sponsors and honoring our promises to them this year. Committee members have meeting outside of our monthly meetings to ensure we are helping each other out and actually functioning as a team. This next month we will be securing contracts for the bands and we will continue to bring on more breweries and beers to the event.    CALL FOR VENDORS We have some wonderful events coming up! Are you a local food/craft vendor? -Touch-A-Truck June 10th -Crazy Days July 14th and 15th -Eastern Oregon Beer Festival August 19th -Community Harvest Festival October 7th If you would like to participate in any or all of these events or would like more information, check it out at https://www.lagrandemainstreet.org/vendor-applications.html. NEWS FROM AROUND TOWN   May Happenings at Cook Memorial Library   There’s a wide range of activities for everyone at the library this May, ranging from Bright Beginnings for Toddlers 0 to 3, the LEGO Club for children up to 12, Teen iCraft for ages 12-18, and a Dungeons & Dragons gaming group for all ages. The Mystery Book Club for adults and Cinema Saturday return this month, along with the Teen Writing Circle and Self-Care Saturday, as well as Storytime each Thursday. Of note, online registration for the Summer Reading Program begins on May 1st and Housing Matters of Union County employee Madelaine Koller will be available every Tuesday and Wednesday from 1 to 4 PM to help with housing-related issues.   For more details, check out their website at https://cookmemoriallibrary.org/. Meet LGMSD   Check out the newest feature on the LGMSD webpage: Meet LGMSD.  Each week, we take you behind the scenes to introduce you to the folks that make us who we are—the Board, the Committees, the volunteers, and the staff. Each week, we plan to introduce you to one of the many individuals who contribute so much to La Grande Main Street and ultimately making La Grande a vibrant, stable, beautiful place to gather, shop, eat, work, live, and play. So far, we have profiled Mary Ann Miesner, the President of our Board of Directors, Joshua Annas, the Vice-President of our Board of Directors, Shawna McKinnis, the Secretary of our Board of Directors, Suzannah Moore Hemann, the Treasurer of our Board of Directors, Carol Summers, Nicole Felty, Timothy Bishop, Bri Troutman, Evie Stacey, Stephanie Hansen, and Lauren Babcock (and Ubi). Next, we will be featuring Tisha Comer, super helper of the Eastern Oregon Beer Festival! Check it out on our website at: https://www.lagrandemainstreet.org/news FLOWER BASKETS   La Grande Main Street Downtown is pleased to announce the return of hanging flower baskets to Downtown for Summer 2023, brought to you by the Union FFA! LGMSD will place 36 flower baskets on the Adams Avenue light poles from 4th St. to Elm St. Baskets will be displayed from mid-May through mid-September.   Sponsorship opportunities include 1 Basket: $100 3 Baskets: $250 7 Baskets: $500 15 Baskets: $1000 All 36 Baskets: $2500   If you would like to sponsor a flower basket, please contact Monica McLaughlin, LGMSD Executive Director - (541) 313-8770 - director at lagrandemainstreet.org 102 Depot St., La Grande, OR 97850 - lagrandemainstreet.org.    All sponsors will be recognized through a sign on the flower basket and on the LGMSD website, newsletter, announcements, and social media. This year is carrying on with fun and exciting events and a forward-moving spirit. Join us in the adventure that is La Grande Main Street Downtown.! Interested in being a Partner? Click here 2023 LGMSD Partners Ad Dad Advantage Mortgage Aguilera's Amazing Aromas Allied Mortgage - a division of Mann Mortgage LLC Associated Design and Engineering BELLA Mercantile Be Well Studio Benchwarmers Pub & Grill Beyond the Lens Photography Birddog Glass Blue Summit Realty Bout Time Boutique Cam Credits Carol Summers City of La Grande Clanktronix/The Archives Claudson's Sew and Soak Community Bank Community Kindness of Eastern Oregon Community Merchants Connected Professional Accountants LLC Country Financial, Paul Swigert Designs By Stef Dochos Dirty Girls Detailing DraWiki Eastern Oregon Title Edward Jones - Shawn Mangum Eleven Fifteen Spa Elkhorn Media Group EOAliveTV EONI Eastern Oregon University Elkhorn Media Group Fairway Independent Mortgage Fitzgerald's Flowers Globe Furniture Grande Ronde Hospital Grande Ronde Soap and Bath Guyer and Associates Hines Meat Company. John Howard and Associates Josh Annas Katie Martin Custom Designs La Grande Theatres Les Schwab Tire Center Let'Er Wrap Longbranch Lucy's Boutiques at the Market Place Underground Mamacita's International Grille Market Place Fresh Foods Mary Ann and Arlan Miesner Merlyn's Catering MJ Goss Motors Mountain Valley Therapy Mountain Works Nate Conklin State Farm Nature's Pantry Northwest Furniture & Mattress OTEC Peak Lifestyle Studio Papa Murphys Take & Bake Raul's Taqueria Real Deals RE/MAX Real Estate Team Rob's Speedy Delivery Rosewood Cottage Scott's Heating and Air Side A Brewing Sim Shot Virtual Range Sorbenots Source One Business Consulting Tap That! Growlers, LLC Teal Cactus Ten Depot Street The Potter's House Timothy Bishop Travelodge Tyler Photo Co Union County Chamber of Commerce/Tourism Wheatland Insurance Wild Child Birth and Photo Woodsy Wicks ​Ziply Fiber   Upcoming Events La Grande Main Street 102 Depot Street La Grande, OR 97850 541-963-1223   Contact Us     Share This Email Share This Email Share This Email About Events Calendar News Contact La Grande Main Street Downtown | 102 Depot St, La Grande, OR 97850 Unsubscribe oms_managers at listsmart.osl.state.or.us Update Profile | Constant Contact Data Notice Sent by director at lagrandemainstreet.org powered by Try email marketing for free today!
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