Episode 7: The Return on Community

What does it take to see potential where others see an empty building?

In this episode of The Calculated Collective, we sit down with Guy Walker, President at Blue Beacon Inc., who never set out to become a downtown developer. Without a background in renovation or commercial real estate, they took a chance, invested in their community, and helped play their part in bringing new life back to the heart of downtown Salina, Kansas.

Our conversation explores the risks, lessons, and long-term vision behind transforming vacant spaces into thriving shops, restaurants, offices, gathering places, and hotels. We discuss why vibrant downtowns matter, what it takes to attract people and investment back to a community, and how thoughtful development can create momentum that lasts for generations.

More than a conversation about buildings, this episode is about believing in a place enough to invest in its future. It's about preserving what makes a community unique while creating new opportunities for businesses, residents, and visitors alike.

Join us as we explore the power of local investment, the courage to learn along the way, and the impact one vision can have on an entire community.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:10

Well, welcome today to another edition of the Calculated Collective. We are here in the beautiful Hoffman building, and today Guy Walker, my friend, neighbor, landlord, client, is joining us to have a little chat. Um, as I put together that little intro, I was like, gosh, she lives behind me, all these things. I didn't realize how many connections there were either, so thanks. And we're in this gorgeous office building that we've been in for a year now, just over a year. So that you guys redid. So, guy, I really wanted to have you come down today and appreciate you taking the time. Talk about I said the name of this has been the calculated collective. And we spend some time talking about risks and the risks people take, and business owners. We spend a lot of time talking about community. And the real reason that I wanted to have you come in today was to talk about downtown Salina. Um Ashley just said she works downtown for nine years. I think Iron and its predecessor, Assurance Partners, has been downtown now for about 13 years in a couple of different buildings. Um, so many things when you talk to the public and people from out of Salina talk about downtown. Um so, not to put you right on the spot without a directive question, but what made you guys get involved behind downtown Salina?

SPEAKER_01 1:33

Yeah, so I mean I think it started with just conversations around town, I think, if I think back. I mean, kind of started a little more loosely than that, even people reminiscing about downtown being more vibrant. Sure. You know, um parent you know, people older than us, our you know, like our parents' generation, can remember a time when it was the only place there really was to even shop. Obviously, that has changed dramatically.

SPEAKER_00 1:55

Multiple theaters.

SPEAKER_01 1:56

Yeah, right. I mean, you had the Fox Theater, the Vogue Theater, but and I have a little bit of a memory of that as a kid, um, but pretty young age, the mall was built, which changed downtown completely. But I would say it kind of started with that type of conversation, and then it started, and then it trip or it morphed into people talking about what we can do to improve our community, how can we help our community grow? Probably the biggest question is how can we get young people to stay here? I remember people asking that a lot. The chamber at the time was starting to talk about that a lot in terms of um workforce retention and expansion because businesses were, you know, I think now it's probably no different now, but there were a thousand open jobs. And so just how do we are there things that we can do to um to kind of shift that to where maybe there aren't so many open jobs and we can encourage people to move here and to stay. So I think that's really, I mean, to me, if I think back, that's probably the starting point.

SPEAKER_00 2:47

Well, that's great. And it made me think that it all doesn't have to be Kansas City Power Line, right? We don't have to have a great big entertainment thing to have a vibrant downtown with a ton of restaurants that we've got today and entertainment and more retail comes all the time. Um so how many years ago did you guys buy the Hoffman?

SPEAKER_01 3:09

Uh so we, oh man, 2019, I believe. Um B um had UMB was was wanting to sell. They still were spread out over all four floors of this building and the entire building next door.

SPEAKER_02 3:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 3:22

So they had people, they had not a lot of people, and but they were taking up obviously a lot of square footage and they were ready to sell and consolidate into the first floor. And honestly, I mean, I have to admit, we really I have we seemed like good real estate. There was a parking lot included, so we were like, sure, we'll give it a try. I mean, we really had honestly had very little idea of exactly what would transpire and what how that would transform. But I it was in some ways, it's been one of the best decisions we've made, not necessarily um well, for a lot of different reasons, but but several, but one I would say stands out the most is it kind of taught us like what is possible down here. Okay. Like we, you know, we were like, okay, well, let's try some office. Surely there's some people that want to be down here. But we really didn't know for sure. And around that time, though, Corey Metlin reached out, who's the fourth floor tenant with tier one. Okay. And he said, you know, gosh, I'd really like to be downtown. And we're like, okay, maybe this can start to work. And in addition to that, we used historic tax credits, state and federal, which that was all just kind of a learning experience to really, I don't know, help maybe educate us, given that we're not like traditional developers, educate us on what's possible and how how you can get things done, you know, like um we would not have been able probably to do the level of finish that we did here without like the tax credit. So it was just an example, I think. It just really, I don't know, really opened my eyes into like, okay, you kind of got to think about this creatively. Like there's multiple buckets of money and multiple ways to like um to uh to analyze a return on investment. And so uh that it's been really helpful from that perspective as we've kind of continued to look at other pieces of real estate downtown.

SPEAKER_00 4:57

Well, it's gorgeous. And for anybody that hasn't come see it, hasn't been to see it, come visit Iron Insurance on the third floor of the Hoffman building and you can see all that they did. It turned out gorgeous. So down on the other end of Santa Fe, you've got a few blocks down on Santa Fe, you've got the hotel. And you said this for 2019. When did you guys start talking about the hotel?

SPEAKER_01 5:20

Well, I think the hotel, I'm glad you asked that because as I think about your first question, I I definitely would want to give, I always try to give credit to that. I mean, it was definitely a community-wide conversation, but Brian Richardson, in my opinion, clearly, yeah, with iron insurance and the field house, and at the time he'd already done Blue Sky. He was buying buildings and fixing them up down here long before really anybody was having a conversation about even and so I want to give him a lot of credit because he really, I think he opened people's eyes, like, hey, this is maybe doable.

SPEAKER_02 5:49

Right.

SPEAKER_01 5:49

Um, so uh, but we so we started having those conversations. It was probably around I think 2014.

SPEAKER_02 5:54

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 5:55

That was when Celina 2020 was formed. Okay. And I think with Brian and some other people, got a group of business people together and community members, and just said, you know, hey, should we give this a try? And our we kind of thought our piece was okay, well, we could do a hotel. We had a couple of other hotels in the hotel. Hotel space. Yep, sure. So we thought, well, that could be our piece.

SPEAKER_00 6:13

Right. Sorry, Brian. I actually remember sitting on a gym floor somewhere with you and him telling me he'd like to build a field house. Yeah. And I could he could put it on that property. And I was like, we might be able to make that an office building, and then we would move downtown. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:28

Because the office building is the only piece of the old hotel that stayed, right? Yeah, which is hilarious to think that was once the Hilton. Right? Now there's a Hilton downtown. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:38

My folks stayed in the hotel this last weekend, and it's just gorgeous. Oh, good. I'm glad they stayed. So it was just fantastic. And you guys have plans you're thinking about to have another one downtown?

SPEAKER_01 6:49

We are. So this the current hotel is a Hilton product. It's home with sweets, but it's a part of the Hilton family. And uh we think that a Marriott product would do really well down here. Marriott's the biggest, um, they're the biggest rewards program in terms of number of people who are enrolled. And uh that's a huge driver for hotel rooms these days for both business travelers and personal exactly on a personal and on a leisure, or I mean on a leisure and a business side. But and there's not a ton of Marriott product here. We've got the courtyard and the fairfield. So it's the biggest, like it's the biggest footprint for the rewards program, and we probably have the least number, it's got the least number of hotel rooms in Celina. So we feel like it's really good fit, and the home was doing really well. So uh yeah, we're excited to be looking at the corner of Walnut and Santa Fe for that. That'll be perfect. Yeah, kind of across. It's currently was the the most recent um use was DVAC. They've moved quite a while ago. Right. Um, and then we were able to get the building behind that under contract. Okay. So uh yeah, it's exciting. Should be kind of similar in the sense of like the homewood runs basically from Santa Fe to Fifth Street along Mulberry. This one would run from Santa Fe to Fifth Street along um Walnut. Wallet. Yeah, perfect.

SPEAKER_00 7:58

Yeah, great location close to the Stiefle.

SPEAKER_01 8:00

Yeah, this I mean that it's kind of a great, it's one of the better corners. I mean, for from a like a retail perspective, at least in my mind, for downtown. You've got Martinelli's, which is super busy, Stiefle, which is a big attraction. So it's like, hey, this is a this is a pretty good spot.

SPEAKER_00 8:12

Martinella's, it's funny. I actually filming this, and she and I talk about Martinelli's, and every time I go out in western Kansas, people find out I'm from Celina, and most people say, that Italian restaurant downtown.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

It is amazing how many people know that. Well, he, you know, I think it's been 25-ish years is that long time. Which is crazy.

SPEAKER_00 8:31

So that's at least I've been I've lived here 26.

SPEAKER_01 8:34

Oh yeah, so longer, yeah. It's a it's definitely become an icon for downtown.

SPEAKER_00 8:38

That's just fantastic. We talk about employees and young people downtown. So Blue Beacons corporate headquarters are here. So how many employees do you guys have locally?

SPEAKER_01 8:51

Oh, well, we have about 210 at like at our corporate area. That's we have a manufacturing and uh uh parts distribution and things that support the truck washes and the car washes out there. So it's about uh roughly 180 at the corporate office, 30 in that uh that side of the business, which is called powerback. But then we have probably roughly 50 employees at the homewood and then uh roughly 50 at the truck wash.

SPEAKER_00 9:16

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 9:16

So we're I mean we're around 310-ish. I mean, that's high level, but yeah. That's locally, I guess, is how yeah, total.

SPEAKER_00 9:24

Well, that's great. Uh yeah. And for for everybody else that has employees in town, we just all community-wide um need to do a little part to make downtown better. I'm excited about saw an article the other day about the river project still still lynching along. What a what a long road that is.

SPEAKER_01 9:42

Um that's a lot of work. Incredibly long road and a lot of requires a lot of different resources, but I'm yeah, I'm same. I'm excited to see that hopefully break around here in the next 12 months because of like you said, it's connection, it's a big part of it is so like runs right through downtown basically. So should serve as another, you know, kind of anchor for for the long-term success of downtown.

SPEAKER_00 10:04

Connects downtown over to TPAC.

SPEAKER_01 10:05

Most definitely, yeah. Yeah. In my mind, it connects a lot of the community in general. We have a decent trail system, but they're all sort of they're all kind of broken apart by stretches of the community that don't have a trail. I this to me really links like a lot of it, which I think will be phenomenal. That'll be fine. Super excited about it, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:22

So what's going on in downtown?

SPEAKER_01 10:25

I try almost all the time to share about the small businesses because is I think there's a I mean I so downtown is doing well, and I I don't want to, I don't want to like rain on that parade. But I also do always like to share that we because some of our leases are percentage rent-based, so we actually get to see the sales numbers for a few of the restaurants and retailers, so we get to see how they're doing. And uh while I don't ever share that, like the you know, the the details of that, I do think it's important though that Celina Downtown seems super vibrant and it is, it's doing well. But I do very much think that um, well, I guess I'll put it this way, it keeps me up at night, wondering, will it continue to grow and improve? Or I feel like we're still very much at a tipping point where the wrong decisions or um what's the right, um, you know, just things not maybe going our way, it could very easily tip the other direction and start to go back kind of towards what it was before with a lot of empty storefronts and things like that. So that I always do like to just to talk about how um we kind of view all that we do as whether it's buying real estate and serving as landlords or whether it's buying real estate and trying to help uh small businesses get into business, we really just view that as always trying to take incremental steps to make sure that it um can stand the test of time, I guess.

SPEAKER_00 11:45

I think that makes sense. And and I always tell everybody, I mean, it takes the community to all these small businesses, right? Very much. This the second part of our office here is in the Nelson building, and that turned out gorgeous, uh a different vibe than the Hawking, but yeah, gorgeous with with the bookstore, and I'll I'll I forget the name of Peachy Cheeks.

SPEAKER_01 12:04

He's the new one, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:06

Yep. So I've been in there, it looks really cute, but yeah, um, hopefully they do well.

SPEAKER_01 12:10

I hope so, yeah. I hope so. They're they are probably the newest retailer. Um, and they uh was one of the few times the other cool really cool thing about that is at least in my experience, it's one of the few times where we've been approached. Typically, it's kind of been the other way around where we've been reaching out to people like recruiting and like, hey, do you want to come check out this space? And so she reached out to us actually. Okay. And you know, wanted to open a store. They're new to the area, and so they wanted she wanted to, she has some retail experience and uh wanted to open a store. And so it was really nice to be on the other end. I bet. Yeah, it was great to have somebody reach out to us instead of us recruiting.

SPEAKER_00 12:45

Well, it was funny to watch the the market shop turn change change hands and then then stay, right? What a nice turn of events that is versus somebody shutting down.

SPEAKER_01 12:55

Yeah, I think it I right very easily could have gone the other way where it just closed and we would have lost another business that's probably been down here. I can't remember how long it was, close to 30 years, I think. Probably it's great to see it change hands and stay with somebody locally and staying in this block.

SPEAKER_00 13:09

I I I go in the um prairie land market um yeah fairly frequently. I just had lunch there. I go there all the time. I work pretty regularly.

SPEAKER_01 13:21

Absolutely. I go there quite regularly. It seems to be doing well. It is, yeah, it's actually doing extremely well. I'm thrilled. I I was it was another one of those gambles, you know, where you don't really know how it's gonna do. And it uh there's a strong board and I was gonna say the vision of that bull took some risk again, and but the community supported it. I mean, uh the board fundraised to get it done and uh was able to really fundraise to really to complete the project and really make it kind of special, not just barely complete it, but it feels a pretty unique place for a community of our size. And I am thrilled to hear or to report that it is doing really well. It's it's uh yeah, it's I think it's gonna be I think it's gonna be just fine.

SPEAKER_00 14:00

Yeah. Well, and then as I I wasn't in going in per any particular direction nor down the street, but you can uh hopscotch and go from uh restaurant to restaurant to store all the way down the street. And it's just fun to walk up and down the street these days.

SPEAKER_01 14:15

Yeah, and we have uh don't have the lease signed yet, but we are negotiating lease with a uh kind of a breakfast style, breakfast lunch style restaurant. Oh fun. So that's exciting. Yeah, yep. Can't I can't share really who it is yet just because, like said, the lease isn't signed, but it was another example of where they were they weren't necessarily coming to Salina to look specifically at downtown, but once they saw it, they thought that it seemed like a good fit for their restaurant. So it's great. They have two other restaurants um under the same name. So not in Salina, but um in Wichita.

SPEAKER_00 14:45

Oh great. You know, we're visited here by a bunch of insurance companies that come from sometimes Wichita, but mostly Kansas City. And and everybody that comes through town and and visits us at our office, they're just amazed by how vibrant and energetic downtown feels like almost every day. Yeah. Um some of them complain about parking, but that's yeah, part of what we're gonna hear about.

SPEAKER_01 15:07

Hear that quite frequently, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, as related to the hotel, the second hotel, that block it's a lot harder to find like down where the current hotel is at the homewood, it was a little easier to find land to uh to build surface parking. So that's gonna be one of the challenges, I think. Probably not for just the hotel, but my thought is, or my think, my guess is for the whole downtown in general. I think as it continues to hopefully grow and get more vibrant, right? Yeah, parking will continue to be a challenge. So we'll probably long term, I'm guessing we'll have to figure out how to address that.

SPEAKER_00 15:40

I I would think so. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:42

Um, but especially as there's more daytime and office users and things like that.

SPEAKER_00 15:46

But a few more steps in my life would not be a bad thing.

SPEAKER_01 15:49

Fair enough. I know I really love I'm I'm the worst because I love to walk. And so it's like I'm like, well, I I walked or I parked half a block away. What's the big deal? Right. But it's a big deal for the retailers. I mean, the retailers they're probably the ones that feel it the most, I would say, in terms of if it's if it's really full down here, I think it can be pretty challenging for them.

SPEAKER_00 16:07

Well, I always I always try to not park in front of the bookstore, right? Even though I have a pet all like try to stay away from that, yeah, that parking.

SPEAKER_01 16:15

So yeah. I think the other thing that makes a big difference, and I it just kind of ties back into where we started the conversation. It's amazing to me what as I've learned. As I said, we work with some of the small businesses and a few of the restaurants, and I've learned how much of an impact like the field house makes when there's things happening there. And even not just the field house, but if there's a base, like if there's a baseball tournament in town and they're playing at Billberg and you know up at Markley, it's it makes a huge impact for the weekend sales of both the retailers and the restaurants. So that's something that I think um I've been talking to Renee a little bit at the chamber about, you know, they're starting this community-wide marketing effort. And obviously they they have Visit Salina, which is responsible for bringing people to town, and just the importance of that. It's it while I agree, we very much need to rely on our own community. The the visitors make a huge, huge impact.

SPEAKER_00 17:06

Well, they're coming to town, and if we can get them to come downtown as a place to head somewhere else, just like when we go to a town, uh if there's talk about downtown or hey, have you been to Martinelli's? Yeah. Well, even if Martinelli's is packed, well, now we've got other restaurant spaces for people to come downtown, stay there, go to the Auto Museum, um, other ways to kill time during their day.

SPEAKER_01 17:27

Sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:28

We've talked about the field house and the activity that it drives for the weekend, right? We talked about back in the day when there used to be two theaters, and I can't even imagine what downtown would have looked like uh on most nights back then. I know when the Stiefle has an event and I'm still downtown, it's just packed on those nights. And I think I think that's important to drive traffic when I'm not here during eight to five, right?

SPEAKER_01 17:52

Um, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 17:54

How how do we get people to stay downtown of a night or bring them back downtown when there's not a show at the Stiefle?

SPEAKER_01 18:00

Yeah, well, I think uh I'm glad you mentioned the Stiefle just because I did I forgot to bring it up, but maybe because I now take it for granted, which I shouldn't, because it in my mind, when I look at the impact, I mentioned the field house, Stiefle is equal or maybe even more in terms of its impact on the small businesses and the and the uh restaurants. The night there's a show, right? It's even if it's a show that I think from their perspective maybe doesn't sell that well, it still makes an enormous impact on the restaurants. Correct. Uh so yeah, it's it's huge. But I think trying to figure out, I think because well, I always like to say too, we really don't know what we're doing. We're trying, we're kind of learning as we go. This is not what we do, you know. We wash cars and trucks. But but we are when we try to talk to a lot of people and we try to, you know, we we try obviously Celina 2020 is not just Blue Beacon, it's a it's a wide swath of people around the community. So we try to get a lot of people's perspectives. But I think I think the the the key to me is I mentioned that tipping point earlier, and I think we're just trying to figure out what we can do over the next say five to 10 years to make sure that downtown stays vibrant for the next 20 to 30. I don't know that we know the answers exactly what that is, but I think you brought it up. I mean, certainly more daytime users, more office users is huge. Right. But then what what then is what's what's happening at night? What kinds of entertainment options are there available for people to be down here at night? I mean, the show, the Stefan's huge, but it's probably 60 to 70 nights a year. Well, there's still 300 others. Right. So what are the different things that are possible and what kinds of things could be um uh what what kinds of things could do well downtown while providing you know more more reasons for people to come down here and come down and come down here regularly. Um so we're we're right, I mean, I think the the only thing I can really think of, at least right that's really um I feel like close enough that I could even share it, is we are working on kind of a new entertainment style piece. I can't really go into a lot of detail because it's super early, but we're having conversations with the city and even the state of Kansas on what does that look like? Like what kind of entertainment thing could we uh could would make sense to to be downtown. So thinking more about nighttime, thinking more about um various generations, you know, how do we get young people down here, how do we get Kansas Westland students to come down, how do we get students from K-State Salina to, you know, be willing to drive all the way across town to come down here. So just trying to really think through what could that be. And and we've got some different partners involved who are more well-versed than we are in what that may be. So I mean, I mean, I think it could be pretty exciting, but we have we have a I would also say we have a long way to go on bringing it to reality.

SPEAKER_00 20:44

When you when you say tipping point, what I think of is okay, it's one thing to make a have a decision bring a business in that doesn't work, right? There they're some are gonna fail.

SPEAKER_01 21:00

Sure. Yeah, no question.

SPEAKER_00 21:02

Versus bringing in a business that then messes up everything that was successful. Is that is that kind of what you mean by tipping point?

SPEAKER_01 21:09

Yeah, I do. I mean, I think I look at it multiple ways. That's definitely one way. I I yeah, because it's I mean, it would almost be worse to make some in my mind anyway, I uh to to have some large project and then have it fail. I do think you're right. Yeah, that could almost be more uh more detrimental to the long-term health of downtown than just not doing it at all. Right. Well you talked about generational, right?

SPEAKER_00 21:32

You bring in something that my generation may like and the but nobody cares if they're under the age of 40.

SPEAKER_01 21:37

Right. Yeah, I know what you mean. I feel yeah, yeah. And then and those are, you know, that's tricky because that it's changing fast. All the time. And it's hard to know what what those things are. And and then and then you've got the added complication in my mind of what's sustainable in a town of 50,000. That's a huge, you know. You can go to larger communities and you're like, wow, this is amazing. I would love to have this in Salina. And it's like, there is no way we can make that work. I mean, I would love it. to sure but it just just doesn't seem possible so yeah it's that's those make it all I mean all those things kind of to me add to the difficulty of of where do you go yeah because we're only 50 000 what yeah plus whatever regional draw we have a good we do have a great regional draw and I wouldn't want to discount that because we it's enormous the impact that the out of county tags make on Celina not just downtown but I mean if you drive through Sands and Walmart and Target it's unbelievable how many out of county plates there are. But I think you mentioned earlier I think you know how do we get them how do we get them to come down here. Right. And so that's those are the kinds of questions that that we ask ourselves all the time.

SPEAKER_00 22:33

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 22:34

Well hopefully we have more rooms for them to stay downtown yeah yeah that that could make a big and that you know that I mean that's probably that was the biggest driver I think for Blue Beacon even thinking about building a second hotel was just thinking like long term what can we do. And it's like well the current hotel's doing well and so you know a second one that's another hopefully hundredish people down here every day and night. Right. You know so um just thinking again what you know what can we do that's reasonable but and but hopefully adding to the long-term success.

SPEAKER_00 23:02

Well when we talk about regional draw right the the hospital's got a new project going for I forgot about that I'm glad you mentioned that I heard Joel talk about this a month or so ago and 40% of all of their stuff comes from out of the county.

SPEAKER_01 23:16

I think Stiefel has a similar number I think theirs is 40 plus percent of the community theater used to have a number that way too right right I forgot I'm glad you mentioned that that hospital project hospital's a huge driver for downtown in general and that's a really big project so that's pretty exciting to see it coming especially that close to I mean it's like walk so walkable for for people who are there.

SPEAKER_00 23:35

So yeah it's of course and then to utilize an old space that yeah nobody really knew what what what would happen.

SPEAKER_01 23:42

Right. Yeah it is it's pretty exciting I'm glad you brought mentioned that I like utilizing old spaces as they're finishing up work on the last lee building yeah that's gonna I I forgot I always forget about that too pretty amazing to have in a community of 50,000 to see those old big you know historic buildings repurposed is great. I agree because it's not easy. I think they use to store tax credits as well. I think they did which uh yeah which they're they're they're they can be a little bit challenging but they make a big difference in terms of you know being able to get a good return on the older as you know these older buildings need a lot of love.

SPEAKER_00 24:14

So yeah they do so but our landlord's good so yeah thanks I'm glad to hear that yeah they they try thank you for that we were just we were just talking about um activities and entertainment right and one of the things that we do get we do have is first Fridays.

SPEAKER_01 24:31

Yep first Fridays and the and then the farmer's market as well the farm and art market that starts in May goes through about October. And the other cool thing about that that I had forgot to mention earlier was there's a new pavilion. It's under construction right now which will be really cool I think it should it'll be cool for the farm and art market but it should also be great for concerts at that stage so people don't have to sit out in the summer on the hot asphalt there'll be shade available so is construction going to be done by the time the it will not be done by the time the farmers market is starting but I think but I'm hoping that they'll be able to have kind of the second half of their season in with in in the pavilion. Okay. So um there's been some pretty significant delays from the manufacturer it's like a pre-fab deal that comes in pieces and then they erect it on site but it's all prefab pre-manufactured and really while they were very very good at a really pretty picture uh the execution has slacked a little bit but but I I think those types of things I I look at um how much of a difference they have made for I mean I know a little bit about the bookstore obviously and the first Fridays have become a huge night. In a couple of hours they can make a really significant amount of sales and so I just wanted to give a little bit of credit to Salina Downtown Inc. I think they've done a good job of pivoting you know a few years ago so they they've done First Fridays for a while and it wasn't what they wanted it to be wasn't super well attended it wasn't there wasn't a ton of participation uh by the businesses but they really worked hard I think to kind of change the way it worked they went to people and tried to get them stay open later and I think they really turned it into something that has made a big difference. It's I you come down here on a First Friday and typically you can't get into the restaurants the small the little retailers are full of people shopping we still need people to try to come try to come get into the restaurants yeah we do absolutely yeah please don't I don't yeah because I can feel the energy on the day I feel the energy of downtown different than any other day. I would agree with you yeah same with me and I and that though I for me as a patron just of downtowns in general one of the reasons I like them is because of the vibrancy. Yeah you know you want it to have a certain energy so those sorts of things are huge and I I think I just I feel like that's a big part that I wouldn't want to forget to to mention.

SPEAKER_00 26:39

Nope they've done a good job so as as we close this up today um guy what was what was really the reason that that prompted you to get behind all of this and yes yes for people to stay and live in Celina. Yeah um but what what's your why my personal why sure um what because I work for Blue Beacon now I'm just kidding because I was forced to no I uh you know I you guys have done you guys have been so generous to the community whether it's thank you for saying that that's nice community has been good to us as well so it was both whether it's the zoo or the gorgeous hotel we've talked about um even the outdoor space I was down there listening to music on a Thursday a couple weeks ago I mean just just a gorgeous space but you guys have been generous to the community appreciate you saying the community's been generous to you but don't don't want to not talk about blue beacon but yeah what's well I first uh the other thing that has been big for us from a from a company perspective is it as we um our cut the company's 53 years old so it's because of the growth and I mean I'm we're obviously seeing this now the because of the growth of the company and the trajectory that it took we have a ton of retirements.

SPEAKER_01 27:53

We've had a lot over the last say five years and we've got a lot more to go in the next five to where there's going to be a pretty significant amount of turnover of our corporate office more than we've ever had in any one like 10 year period. And so it's been it's been really maybe rewarding is the right word or like to see how beneficial downtown has been to recruiting. We typically are I mean we're sometimes a lot of times in the operation side we're bringing people that already work for the company but they live in places like Atlanta you know Dallas. There's more to do there? Yeah just a little bit and and while they you know some of them have a drive they like they kind of like the idea of a small town I most of them also go yeah but we are making a trade-off here of having things to do. And so just to see the impact downtown has made on our ability to recruit and people's desire not just like oh okay I'll move there because it's a good job but hey this is going to be this is going to be great you know we're excited to move there because of different things and one key aspect of that has been downtown. So that's been really cool from a company perspective. And then from a personal perspective I don't know it's a little I'm not I don't know if I can answer the question really very well other than just to say I enjoy I'm not really a and I don't know why but I've never really been like a big box shopper. I'm not like it doesn't really interest me to be shopping at the giant retail stores. I really prefer anywhere we travel we try to seek out downtown because that's typically where the small businesses and the local businesses are located. And so just for me I that just that's that's probably my personal drive is just to see the small businesses open and hopefully do well. And uh you know and and to me it kind of creates a creates a sense of community and like a fabric of downtown that you just don't get when you go into a huge retailer. So that's probably my I think that's my personal and I'm a little bit competitive so I also want to see downtown do really well even though we have this giant you know out south like obviously core shopping area which is super important to the community.

SPEAKER_00 29:49

I don't want to imply that it's not like the community can we can't do well without that but I also view it like I don't think we can do well as community long term without a really vibrant downtown as well not a community as a whole right we've got to have both of them so spoiler alert Costco's not coming to downtown South I heard Trader Joe's once which would be amazing. That would be amazing no I think it takes I I talked about community a lot right and I talk about we talked about the river right it takes everything and I might not like water I do but uh whether it's the river or the churches or the arts or the live entertainment or it takes all of them to have a vibrant community that attracts people because you don't know that everybody likes the bookstore.

SPEAKER_01 30:35

Right right no it's a great it's very true I all those things play a key role because everybody has different interests and different things different things that people may want to come here for the cozy end yeah that's right absolutely for I'm sure that's why