Thoughts on Creating a Niche Destination

Recently we have had many conversations about the concept of Centralia becoming more of a “Niche Destination.”  These conversations have revolved mostly around what kind of businesses we want to place in the Wilson retail space.  Every business adds or subtracts from the reforming ‘image’ of the historic downtown. 

Through this process the consideration of each ‘business image’ has come up many times in our evaluation process.   We have noticed that one of the mainstays of successful historic downtown areas is the mix of businesses are not replicated in the standard strip mall or outlet mall.  Often times the distinction is the unique diversification of the businesses that have an outstanding “personality” of their own.  The business mix seems to be critical to the overall ‘look & feel’ of a place.