Comments on Blowing & Drifting
So true! My hubby is a NY Italian, and we're always lamenting that we need a "coke and a slice". I even have the best name for it - Il Forno - which is Italian for "the oven" and it could go in the oven-shaped store that used to be our favorite bagel place. And how about a mom/pop type little groc store down here by the soccer fields? A place that sells frozen treats to all the soccer kids and coffee drinks to the parents. Yes, please, good bar food. I like the bovine place but that's just a lot of cheese on one plate. Why don't YOU open the outdoor store??
I love the idea for the pizza place in the old bagel place! It DOES look like an oven!!! Oh, and the idea of a little shop near Spring Creek Park---genius. Although I don't think there's any location-friendly parcels of free land. But it's a great idea.
Thai food is a necessity of life. The skier exchange program is off until you get a thai restaurant over there...
You suggested, "Convenience store east of Washington..."
Well, here near the northwest corner of Northfield (for the moment), we need a c-store on the west end of St. Olaf Ave (like the Ole Store used to be) or on the west end of North Ave (corner of North and "Cedar" (behind the city pumping station) would be my choice as long as we get some adequate pedestrian protection and a bike lane.
THAI FOOD NOW! Seriously, these are all good ideas, but the lack of Thai food may be Northfield's greatest weakness.
I'll vote for all of your suggestions - especially the pizza place. As a NY transplant, I miss really good Brooklyn-style "zah" like crazy!
To further add to the list, I'll propose (not in any particular order):
1. Sushi (the good stuff - not the crap sold in grocery stores).
2. A decent office supply store.
3. An Italian and/or Jewish Deli (authentic - none of this midwestern pre-sliced, pre-packaged coldcut stuff).
4. A FRESH fish merchant of some kind - I'd pay tons more for good fish flown in the night before from either coast.
5. Homemade Ice Cream, a la Coldstone Creamery.
6. A traditional butcher shop, local meats, cut the way you like them. Let's get Nerstrand Meats to open up a branch operation in Northfield!
7. Bring back the Ole Store!
Hmmmm...is there any reason why most of the suggestions are food-based?
Please, for Thai food.
In Chicago, we had 3 Thai restaurants
withing a block of our apt, oh so good.
Went to the King and Thai in cities, too far, too dark, too expensive,not as
good as neighborhood Thai!
Jewish deli, yeap, very old wish of mine
listed back last year!
Great idea for a post ...
Rumor has it that back in the day there was a Trivial Pursuit question: What town has two colleges and only one bar?
Today's Northfield has to be similarly uncommon -- a city with two Indian restaurants and zero Italian joints.
Pizza schmizza. I want low lighting, spicy tomatoes and whole-wheat linguini. The kind of place I can take my sweetie for a night out.
Thanks for all these comments, everyone! I posted a bit of an extended response over at Northfield.org, but here let me just say I'm glad to see so much agreement on the need for some small-scale commercial growth in town! Well, large scale but diversified if Skip has his way. I'm especially glad that Thai am really on to something with my last item.
MnMom, the only things keeping me from opening an outdoors store are lack of money, lack of experience, and lack of gumption. Oh, and the need to have a reliable income. But for those things, I'd be scouting a spot along the river tomorrow!
Tom, I remember that question! I got it wrong, and then later got wait-listed by one of the two schools. Of course, later they gave me a job, so I guess I came out all right in the end.
Great ideas, I think ice cream is the best bet of the five.
Here are my tips to make it happen:
1. find an expert in each field to pull it off. Should be easy in this town given all of the creative people here.
2. Have that person take a vow of poverty, since they are not going to make much of a living. The tradeoff is you get to do what you love.
3. Find a bank willing to loan the money to start up the business. This could be tough since banks hate giving loans to small business start-ups. Remember what they say, most will fail in the first year.
4. Don't lose faith. 60% of Northfielders will never set foot in your shop, they prefer to shop in Burnsville and Apple Valley or online.
5. This one is the most important. The customers you do have will make it all worthwhile. They will appreciate your hardwork and hopefully you can actually earn a living.
Don't even get me started on what businesses Decorah needs! We love to come to Northfield because you have so many more restaurants/shops to choose from than do we! And then there's the fact that you're only a few minutes from the cities where you can get anything you possibly could need. We have to drive at least one hour to find the nearest Target or Home Depot! But, on the flip side, that is exactly why we moved here, to get away from all of that. Go figure!
My girlfriend and I were just talking about the idea of an outdoor store on the corner of 2nd and Hwy 3, where Maria's was. Unless it's a smaller place, it doesn't really belong on Division. Wouldn't want to mess with the aesthetics there! But we definitely need someplace to buy our gear locally! If you're an investor, let us know. Lots of experience starting and running successful businesses!
Pizza? That's the only thing Northfield has enough of. I can't believe a two college town doesn't have a sports bar. Buffalo Wild Wings would rule.
It's not just pizza, of which Northfield has a surfeit - it's a certain kind of pizza: pizza you can get as a quick lunch on the go, rather than pizza you have to order by the pie, wait around to get, etc. I guess I'd probably add chains and franchises to my list of businesses Northfield doesn't need, though I can agree that there's a niche for a place with a few big TVs. (See the fourth item in my list.)
Northfield has enough pizza places -- I agree. It's just too bad many of them are hardly distinguishable. Or, as my beloved says, it's all "squared pizza."
I wouldn't balk at any new good-food option, but it's my stomach's opinion that before we get another restaurant designed for a "bite of lunch," we could use another option to sit down, take a load off, and have some supper.
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