Community: City of Muskegon
Population: 10,000+
Muskegon’s Western Market is a collection of 17 small-scale retail shops. The project was created as a way to attract visitors to downtown Muskegon, and to provide low-cost start-up opportunities for local businesses. These small retail spaces – or “chalets” – range from 90 square feet to 150 square feet with rents between $1,325 and $2,125 for the entire season. With a waiting list of interested businesses, Muskegon formed a committee to curate the selection of stores at the Western Market ensuring a balanced assortment of vendors and products. The chalets are sited to activate a key vacant lot downtown, and they help to strengthen the presence of walkable, urban retail in Muskegon. Muskegon’s Western Market is designed, built, and managed by City staff, and operates from May to October, with a holiday market in November and December.
Replicability:
This project is a quick, low-cost means of introducing additional retail options in a community of any size. Muskegon’s Western Market was inspired by both holiday-themed markets in large cities and retail revivals in small villages. Such a concept is highly adaptable; any number of chalets can occupy anything from vacant land, to the edge of an underused parking lot. Additionally, the broad availability of pre-fabricated structures offers a simple solution for communities unable to hire a custom-builder.
Many communities have a central gathering space – typically a downtown or major shopping center – that has the potential to support additional activity. Couple that with community members interested in opening or expanding their own business, but perhaps unable to afford or commit to a more traditional lease agreement. By building on features found in communities everywhere we were able to introduce an affordable entry point for small business owners.
Creativity and Originality:
While many know retail as big box stores and strip malls, small projects can still make a big impact. In today’s unpredictable retail environment, taking small, incremental steps is critical to ensuring a resilient place. Fortunately, the Muskegon community and leadership is very supportive of not only the tenets of placemaking, but smart and sustainable growth.
At a time when downtown was considered an unproven retail market, Muskegon chose to capitalize on the many major local events and festivals happening there, as well as the added benefit of being home to the second largest farmers market in Michigan, drawing over 15,000 visitors per week. The chalets have since become a downtown staple, but it’s easy to forget that they are, in fact, temporary. The project’s site is currently being marketed for redevelopment, so the structures were built to be relocated when the property sells.
Maintaining a high level of commitment and intentionality in managing the project helps with its continued success. However, the true creativity and originality of this project comes directly from the small business community. Our vendors are the ones that bring Muskegon’s Western Market to life and allow for a project like this to thrive.
Community Impact:
In a city that lost much of its traditional downtown core to urban renewal and an urban indoor mall in the 1970s, the impact of the Western Market is transformational – perhaps even a bit radical. Following the mall’s demolition, large vacant lots lined many downtown streets and the resulting shortage of available and affordable retail space left a gap difficult to fill. Years later, with redevelopment occurring at an ever-quickening pace, small-scale retail still had limited entry points downtown.
Muskegon’s Western Market allows for a wide range of business owners to open up shop in a prime location on Western Avenue – the city’s Main Street. The chalets house first-time entrepreneurs alongside satellite stores for established businesses by offering rents far lower than the going downtown rates. After a successful first year in 2017, two of the 12 original vendors were able to move on to open their own brick-and-mortar storefronts, one only a few blocks from the Western Market.
Truly only a small part of Muskegon’s larger downtown revitalization efforts, the Western Market bridges a key gap between the Muskegon Farmers Market and the existing shops, restaurants, and cultural attractions to the west. Connecting these destinations has contributed to a more unified and walkable downtown for residents and visitors.
