The Hillsdale Business Association will sponsor Hillsdale’s first Art Around Town event today, hoping to attract more residents and college students to visit the downtown area and patronize local businesses.
The HBA hopes to bring in around 300 people to see downtown Hillsdale and experience it’s business community through a local advertising campaign that is flooding Hillsdale with radio advertisements, newspaper advertisements, posters, and advertisements in the “Simply Hers” magazine.
HBA President and Filling Station Deli owner Cindy Bieszk said the purpose of Art Around Town is to give people a good first look at the Hillsdale business community.
“People don’t realize what a great viable downtown we have,” she said. “This gives us that chance to get them in the door and it’s up to us as shop owners to give them a reason to come back.”
Director of Hillsdale’s Economic Development department Mary Wolfram is the HBA committee chair and is organizing Art Around Town. She compiled a list of businesses that have agreed to host artists, and then pairs each artist with a business. Businesses may make arrangements to bring in their own artist, however.
“The whole goal of Art Around Town is to promote business,” she said. “Now the side effect is we’re also going to promote art, but that is a really good thing because the more we promote the arts, the better we are as a community, both culturally and financially.”
Kevin Conant, owner of Here’s To You Pub & Grub, arranged to host tattoo artist and past resident of Hillsdale Mike Hudson. Pub & Grub is offering an extended happy hour for the event.
“It’s great exposure for our local artists,” said Jane Stewart, owner of Smith’s Flowers. “It’s also a great thing for us to get a different amount of foot traffic through our doors.”
Smith’s Flowers’ products also fit in well with the theme, Stewart said. She sees her employees as artists because creating flower arrangements takes skill to pick appropriate colors and organize flowers in order to make beautiful arrangements.
Other businesses participating in Art Around Town are not in retail and likely won’t make immediate revenue, but Wolfram said these businesses recognize the need to create a thriving downtown and know they may gain in the long term by encouraging community involvement.
“Some businesses are supporting it out of the goodness of their heart or because they see the financial benefit of having a lot of activity in the downtown,” Wolfram said.
Krista Miller, who works at Sumner-Scholl Insurance, said the agency will host painter Elizabeth Davis even though the agency is not involved in retail.
“It’s an opportunity to be involved in the community,” Miller said.
