Downtown Denville

Downtown Life

The Holidays in downtown Denville

While we have discussed a Denville After Dark event for the holidays, in view of the new recent restrictions and slow and steady incline of COVID cases, we will not be able to have one. That being said, it is crucial that everyone supports our local small business community as much as possible. Many stores are offering private after-hours shopping, local delivery, outside pick up, and more.

Downtown Denville will be sharing more ways you can support your favorite small business over the next few weeks, but we encourage you to keep as much of your spending in Denville as possible so we can ensure these business make it to 2021.

Buy Early, Buy In Denville

Our downtown businesses offer something unique that malls, big box stores, and online retailers don’t. And you might not even realize it.

The business owners are actually on premises every single day, and these are some of their faces.

These businesses aren’t just investments to them. They are the heart, sweat, blood, and tears of how they support their family, and the fulfillment of some of their big childhood dreams. They are in their stores helping you select the perfect gift, making suggestions for a new outfit you want, and sizing your feet for a pair of shoes. They are planning the menu, choosing just the right ingredients, and making your meal. They are ringing up your purchases, gift wrapping, sweeping the floor, taking out the recycling, staying early and closing late. They remember your name, ask about your kids, and when they thank you for coming in, it’s sincere.

As the holiday season is barreling towards us, the future of many of our small businesses is uncertain. Running a small business is challenging enough, but with the twists and turns that 2020 and the pandemic has thrown them, it is important that you continue to support small businesses whenever possible to ensure that your favorite stores and restaurants are still here next year. While downtown Denville has been relatively lucky that we haven’t lost businesses yet directly due to COVID-19, that doesn’t mean they don’t need your attention. They do. This holiday season matters in a very big way to them, and to our community, and we can’t stress the importance of shopping and eating local enough.

Many of our businesses offer online ordering, free delivery, and some have even been known to facetime you from the store to help you select the perfect gift if you can’t come in. When considering the lure of free shipping from online retailers, just remember the names of the businesses that are on the backs of shirts that Little League kids are wearing at the baseball games and who is putting together and donating Tricky Tray baskets for your local fundraising event.

Beyond supporting these businesses with your dollars, you can also support them by liking their Facebook and Instagram pages, and commenting on and sharing their posts. That engagement helps their pages get seen by more and grow their audience. Have you had a wonderful experience with one of our downtown businesses? Leave them a review on their Facebook, Google or Yelp pages.

Although the holiday season seems far away, it starts now. And with you. Thank you, as always, for your continued support of our community. It’s what will keep us the number one downtown in Morris County. Now let’s finish 2020 strong.

Denville Wins Best Downtown {2020}!

Although we have always known it, now others will as well … Denville has been crowned Best Downtown in Morris County by the 2020 Readers’ Choice Awards from Morris/Essex Health & Life magazine! Beyond the overall downtown award win, many of our stores, restaurants, and service-based businesses have taken top honors in their individual categories as well (see below). This comes as no surprise as downtown Denville is a consistent destination to many that seek out our top-rated restaurants, boutiques, and all ’round charming atmosphere.

Ample free parking, upbeat music piped through the sound system on Broadway, gorgeous hanging flower baskets, and a real Small Town USA community environment continues to brings visitors and residents to our area regularly. Small towns like Denville continue to compete daily against large brick-and-mortar businesses, and the personalized customer service and unique mix of establishments edge them out against their competing giants. In a year that has been particularly challenging, awards like this do much to buoy the spirits of small business owners.

Come to Denville and continue to support your local businesses, and they will continue to deliver for you … both in exceptional experiences and in supporting the community. After all, it’s their community too.

A huge thank you to all who voted for Denville in the nomination process – it’s your ongoing support that keeps our community moving forward. Now get out there and shop, eat, and support local!

*Our Downtown Relief Fund is another wonderfully easy to support our community as well; more details can be found here.

Event Recap {Denville After Dark}

Did you attend our third Denville After Dark event last week? Once again, Mother Nature cooperated and nearly 1000 people came downtown to enjoy our merchants, fitness classes, restaurants, live music, classic cars, and more as we closed the streets to provide ample space for everyone to move around.

Both Pure Barre Denville and Prana Yoga took to Broadway for the first ever pop-up exercise classes in the street and many jumped at the chance to participate. Once the classes were finished, live music began from the Sugar Daddy Trio and Christy and Steve, both acoustic rock groups back for their second shows in downtown Denville.

Many retailers stayed open late to take advantage of the festivities, and several restaurants moved additional tables into the street to accommodate more diners. With a few new vendors appearing this time, including the sale of yellow rubber ducks for the Rotary’s upcoming Virtual Duck Race, and caricature artist Steve Nyman, there was really something for everyone to enjoy. Just the ability to safely roam the streets with an ice cream cone or shaved ice in hand was a welcome breath of fresh air to summer.

Tap Into Denville and News12 New Jersey were both on hand to report on the evening, and it was a nice low-key community event for residents and guests to feel good (and safe) about attending.

Our next Denville After Dark event is on Friday, September 25th (at the end of this year’s Restaurant Week, which will be 9/20-24). If you are interested in being an event sponsor, or having a vendor table, please e-mail bmesa@downtowndenville.com.

*above photographs taken by Brad Resnick Photography, one of our bronze sponsors for the evening. Additional sponsors for the evening included Saint Francis Residential Community, The Sheeran Real Estate Group, GYM GUYZ, and The Peer Hyatt Selling Team.

What Have We Been Doing?

Once the Executive Order and state shutdowns began, all of us were scrambling as business owners and professionals.  As a District, we started sharing resources as soon as they became available, and more as we learned about them.  

COVID-19 Resources

We put in place a regularly updated section of our website specifically for every available resource from the state, county, and more, in addition to holding several public Zoom meetings. 

Promoting Available Businesses    

In addition to actively promoting on social media, we shared whatever essential businesses and eateries were offering during this time.  

Logistic Support

We logistically supported a citizen-generated GoFundMe campaign, Denville Strong, that was organized to purchase meals, products and services from local Denville businesses and, in turn, provide those products and services to front-line workers, volunteers and first responders.  Our office administrator was essential in lining up interested businesses to make purchases from and coordinating those efforts.

Relief Fund

We launched a Downtown Denville Relief Fund to hopefully raise enough money to provide grant relief for some of our businesses.  Additional portions of the fund will also help support some of the accommodations we will make and provide for heavy promotion to get people back into downtown once we fully re-open.  The grant application process will begin shortly and will be distributed by an independent sub-committee with a detailed application review. 

Restructuring the Organization

The financial impact of the global pandemic has affected us all.  Our 3 strategic imperatives have always been focused on promoting commerce in the downtown, recruiting the right businesses to our district and funding to support both of those.  The administrative and coordination of those strategies were orchestrated by our full-time Executive Director, Ryan Gleason. Ryan was instrumental in setting up our organization and providing the building blocks for future success, but we are unable to maintain that full-time position.  Instead our resources and finances need to solely focus on immediate support for our businesses now with marketing efforts, relief efforts, re-opening accommodations and continued investment in our downtown experience.  Ryan is working closely with us to transition to this new phase.  Additionally, the Downtown Denville Business Improvement District’s Board of Directors, all of which are district business owners and volunteers, are dedicating tremendous effort and time fulfilling many responsibilities.

As always, our Board of Directors, our volunteers, and our downtown businesses remain committed to continue moving our community forward to maintain its vibrant foothold as a popular Morris County go-to destination.