THE TEN SECRETS OF
DOWNTOWN SUCCESS
By Dolores P. Palma
Today, with downtowns all across the country being revitalized, those interested in turning their downtowns around no longer need to be pioneers. Instead,
they can define effective revitalization strategies by
calling on the successes of others. One of the roads to
downtown success involves using the ten secrets outlined below.
Secret #1:
Form Partnerships
For downtown's future to brighten, both the public
and private sectors must become involved in the enhancement effort. Neither sector can or should try to
transform its downtown alone. Instead, the public
and private sectors need to come together in partnership in order to make decisions together and ensure that
each sector carries its weight to reinvest in and reinvent downtown.
Secret #2:
Know Your Vision
Today, successful downtowns are those that are
vision-driven. This means that a wide variety of constituents have been brought together to define a clear,
shared vision of where they want to go. The defined
vision must be realistic and shared by the business
community, the civic community, the local government, and the citizens. The shared vision must answer a
fundamental question what is the very best our
downtown can be five years from now? The next two
secrets of success a market analysis and business plan
are essential in ensuring that the vision is realistic and
aggressively pursued.
Secret #3:
Be Market-Driven
Conducting a downtown market analysis is THE
critical first step for success. A realistic market analysis
is an economic tool that you cannot succeed without. It
is a tool that developers of shopping malls, retail centers, outlet malls, power centers, etc., would not do
business without. And, to compete on a level playing
field, investors which include business owners,
property owners, real estate developers, and city hall
must have the same information at their disposal.
Today, the most successful enhancement efforts are
more bottom-line oriented and business-like. Taking a
business-like approach to the future means conducting
a market analysis that defines:
Who downtown's customers are;
Who POTENTIAL customers are;
What goods and services these customers and
potential customers want today;
What will they want tomorrow; and
The niche downtown can fill in providing those
goods and services.
Secret #4:
Use A Business Plan
Businesses that operate according to a business plan
are more successful than those that don't . . . and the
same is true for business districts. The most pro-active,
business-like partnerships are starting their programs
by defining a clear course of action that is aggressively
implemented in a timely manner. The business plan
spells out a course of action that will enable downtown
to attain the defined community vision of success and
capture the economic opportunities revealed in the
market analysis.
August 1995 / Illinois Municipal Review / Page 7
Secret #5:
Dare To Be Different
To succeed economically, downtown must create,
carve out, and become known for a particular niche in
the marketplace. It cannot compete head-on with the
malls or with the discounters and expect to win. Instead, it must pursue an economic niche that will allow
it to successfully co-exist with the mails and the discounters by being different and unique.
More and more, this has come to mean that downtown must create its own "economic themes." The goal
is to make downtown distinct so that it will stand out in
the mind of the customer.
Economic themes are created by clustering together
businesses such as apparel or antiques or restaurants
or home furnishings, etc. that appeal to particular
customer groups. By clustering similar businesses near
each other, these businesses become more convenient
for customers and downtown becomes known for those
businesses. In this way, downtown takes on an economic theme or focus that makes it distinct and
distinctive.
Secret #6:
Focus!
In all but the smallest of communities, the downtown area is physically too large to revitalize in one bite
and the issues are too numerous to tackle all at one time.
And, in every community, advocates and skeptics alike want to see visible improvements occur in downtown
immediately.
Because of this situation, the most successful enhancement programs are those where limited resources
time, energy, money, staff, volunteers, etc. have
been focused in well-defined target areas. Concentrating resources in target areas breeds success because it
makes revitalization of the entire downtown seem
manageable over time. Issues seem less overwhelming
when they are resolved one at a time and tangible
results can be clustered so that they become more visible more quickly.
Secret #7:
Be Self-Sufficient
The days of first looking outside your community
for a savior whether that be a new business, anchor,
Page 8 / Illinois Municipal Review / August 2995
investor, or funder are over. Instead, to be successful, local officials must learn to become self-reliant and
resourceful. This means that downtown partnerships,
professionals, and local government officials must become adept at spotting and nurturing local entrepreneurs and getting them to locate downtown. In addition, these same constituents must also "put their money
where their mouth is" when it comes to financing their
enhancement effort rather than expecting funders
from outside the community to bankroll their downtown's future.
Secret #8:
Return to Old-Fashioned Values
The most successful downtowns in America are
and will continue to be those that have realized that
their strength lies in doing business the old-fashioneds
way. This means a return to personalized customer
attention; providing value for money; standing behind
your products; promoting the special, historic appearance of downtown; promoting it as the community's
social, cultural, entertainment, residential, professional
office, and family center; and stressing the community
pride that results from a healthy downtown.
Secret #9:
Be Pro-Business AND Pro-Quality
Within any given community, business owners and
real estate developers have many options when looking
for a location in which to invest. For downtown to be
the investment location of choice, the local government
must be pro-business. This means revising regulations
that make it hard to operate a business or invest property in downtown. Being pro-business also means
streamlining government processes (codes, planning,
licensing, etc.) so that investors can go into business as
quickly as possible.
While being pro-business is essential to downtown's
success, it must go hand-in-hand with being pro-quality. This means that local government should not
and must not be pressured to forego quality in
order to attract investors. Instead, city hall and the
business community must jointly convey the clear message that downtown welcomes quality business
owners, property owners, and real estate developers
those who will operate quality businesses, maintain
quality properties, and reinvest in these investments.
August 1995 / Illinois Municipal Review / Page 9
While our downtowns should not try to and are
not able to compete head-on with malls and win, the
most successful downtowns are those that have learned
and borrowed the best management techniques from
malls. These include the Five M's described below.
Management The downtown partnership
should function much as a shopping mall management company does.
Market Knowledge The enhancement program should be based on a market analysis that
identifies downtown's niches and targeted customers.
Marketing The enhancement program should
include a multi-faceted marketing campaign that
allows downtown and its businesses to communicate with the targeted customers.
Maintenance Downtown must be appealing by
keeping high standards of maintenance for both
private and public property.
Money A goal of the enhancement program
should be to create a financing mechanism that
ensures adequate, predictable, and reliable funds
with which to implement the downtown revitalization effort.
Dolores P. Palma is the president of Hyett Palma, Inc., the only
national consulting firm that specializes in the economic renaissance
of business districts. Based in Alexandria, VA, the firm has served
business districts in all 50 states. The firm's work has been featured in
numerous publications, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, American City & County Magazine, Public Management Magazine, Parking Magazine, and Nation's Cities-Weekly. In addition, the firm's work has received awards of excellence from the American Planning Association, National Capitol Area Chapter, and
the Virginia Downtown Development Association.
OPERATION BABY BUCKLE
Left to right: David Karel, Lil Key, First Lady Brenda Edgar and
Bob Neal.
Operation Baby Buckle, a program of the Safe
America Foundation, is seeking corporate and community sponsorship to help purchase child safety seats.
The people in the photo represent some of the groups
who are part of this public/private partnership, including Primerica Financial Services, the national sponsor,
St. Anthony Hospital, and the Illinois Department of
Transportation. In addition, the National Highway
Transportation Safety Administration, the University
of Illinois at Chicago Emergency Medicine, General
Motors, UPS, Century Products, the Odyssey Cruise
line, and Hanna-Barbera, among others, are all supporting the project. There are also Kiwanis and Lions clubs
signing up to help out.
First Lady Brenda Edgar is Honorary Chairperson
for Operation Baby Buckle in the Midwest.
Goals of Operation Baby Buckle include raising
funds to purchase and then distribute child safety seats
to families who might not otherwise be able to afford
them. This is a nationwide effort, and the ultimate goals
is to distribute 100,000 seats by 1997. In addition,
partners in this project will help educate the public on
safety issues.
$1,000 will allow you to be a 'sponsor' and will
purchase 50 seats.
For information about how to become part of this
group, contact Michael J. Evans, National Sales Director, Primerica Financial Services, 2105 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago. Illinois 60616. or call 312-791-1995.
Page 10 / Illinois Municipal Review / August 1995
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