Small local businesses find ways to survive economic climate

T-shirts, hats, watches and shoes from high-end brands such as Clae, Supra, New Order, Nooka and G-Shock line the walls and stock the display shelves of Dope Couture.

Even with weak nationwide retail sales and a state unemployment rate at about 10 percent, customers apparently still buy the $29 shirts from the Web site and the North College Avenue boutique.

Besides the trendy shop where “indie kids,” skaters, DJs and promoters from IU coexist, businesses in such industries as food, retail, computers, design and life science are starting or expanding in Bloomington.

New businesses face challenges but also have unique advantages. If they can find a niche and sell an outstanding product, they will do well, said Morgan Hutton, advocacy initiatives coordinator for the Bloomington Chamber of Commerce. IU students and alumni help drive the economy in a college town that helps shield it from what’s happening nationwide, she said.

Some businesses are cyclical, said Johannes Denekamp, a senior lecturer in the Kelley School of Business. For instance, he said, in a bad economy, people go back to college and they need books, which companies such as T.I.S. provide.

The economy is fickle, Denekamp said. New businesses, which have a low success rate, have a harder time surviving in the economy, he said. However, they don’t have to deal with slowing sales.

“They don’t have the sense of weathering a downturn,” Denekamp said.

T.I.S. recently opened The Indiana Shop store on Kirkwood Avenue and will open another Indiana Shop in the mall soon.

President of Bloomington-based T.I.S. Tim Tichenor said it wasn’t perfect timing. He said the company doesn’t normally open two stores in a community at the same time, but the opportunity could not be passed up.

The company was in the mall from August 2006 to February 2007 but had to leave because another store that sold IU merchandise had an exclusion clause, meaning T.I.S. could not sell IU merchandise in the mall anymore.

That store left and the mall invited T.I.S. back last September. T.I.S. will now open an additional location in the mall in May.

At the end of 2008, Steve & Barry’s went out of business, leaving a valuable spot on Kirkwood open.

T.I.S. is feeling the bad economy a little bit, Tichenor said, but the IU market should stay strong even in hard times.

Dope Couture’s boutique opened seven weeks ago, and the owner, senior Matt Fields, has plans to expand his line to include more brands, fleece and maybe even denim.
Dope Couture has been online for two years, and it stepped up sales last summer, Fields said.

The store relies on IU students, Fields said. The Internet helps keep the store going.
“While I was sleeping, I sold 15 shirts,” Fields said of his online business.

IU and local staple companies shielded Bloomington’s economy from becoming as bad as many communities in Indiana, Hutton said.

Most businesses are conservative in the bad economy, settling for flat sales instead of the bigger returns they might have expected a year ago, he said.

Banks aren’t willing to give out as many loans for new businesses, but money is still available.

“Locally, there are banks writing loans every day to local people,” Hutton said.
The economic situation in the country is different from anything anyone has been involved with, Hutton said.

“Nobody has the answers,” he said.