STATE OF THE STREET
R-E-P-O-R-T

Business Assistance [More info]

Monies have been made available by the West Central Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission (WCWRPC) to provide incentives and financial assistance for Downtown property and business owners to revitalize their commercial buildings. The Downtown Façade Loan Program loans range from $5000 to $30,000 at 0.00% fixed interest. Improvements may include façade renovation, signs, exterior doors, windows, awnings, exterior graphics, exterior lighting or landscaping. Startup businesses are eligible but must provide an acceptable business plan and show sufficient management background and an equity position in the business. Contact the Rice Lake Main Street Association office for additional information.

WCWRPC has also created a MicroLoan Fund Program to provide small loans to start-up, newly established or growing small business concerns. This loan is at 4.00% fixed rate of interest and amounts range from $5000 to $25,000. Loans may be used in several ways: working capital, inventory, fixtures, real estate acquisition, equipment, lease-hold improvements, building improve-ments, or natural disaster recovery. MicroLoan Fund Program information and local review is handled by Red Cedar Development Corporation. Contact them at 715-234-7008 or PO Box 526, Rice Lake.

The WCWRPC loans described here are available to businesses in Barron, Chippewa, Clark, Dunn, Eau Claire, Polk and St. Croix counties. Each community will have separate entities handling the initial application and review process. WCWRPC will administer the loan, disperse funds and service the loans.

What Does Your Billboard Tell Us?

Think you don’t have a billboard? Oh, but you do! Take full advantage of the 24-hour, 7-days-a-week advertising billboard called your storefront! Read the signals: signage, cleanliness, clutter, debris, hours of operation, condition of paint, brick, siding, current displays and lighting. Are window displays lit at night? Are the windows clean and free of insects? Is the sidewalk swept? Who likes cobwebs around doors or windows? How about the sneaky little weeds that take root in the sidewalk seams? What message does your billboard send?

As warmer temps arrive please make a weekly check-up of your storefront billboard. Pick up that candy wrapper or plastic bag and place it in the trash. Stop to pluck a weed as you walk to the bank or post office. Downtown is a daytime neighborhood for everyone to enjoy. If it isn’t a clean and pleasant place, customers just may go elsewhere. Studies show that people make the decision to enter or not enter a business in just six seconds. First glance of storefronts or window displays can make the difference of feet inside your business or walking on down the street. Think about it.

Did You Know?

Did you know that the Rice Lake Main Street Association has a reinvestment loan program in cooperation with many of our local banks? Loans of up to $25,000 at prime rate are available to business property owners located in the Business Improvement District. Façade renovation applications must be pre-approved by the Design Committee. Dairy State Bank, Sterling Bank, US Bank, Bank Mutual, Johnson Bank and Royal Credit Union have pledged a total of $1,250,000 for this program.

Did you know that the Design Committee also offers a matching-sign-grant program? Downtown businesses may apply for assistance for new or upgraded signs in the Business Improvement District. The Committee offers a dollar-for-dollar match with a maximum payout of $500 for pre-approved signs. Appropriate signs are a great investment for any business. Free design consultation is also available.

Did you know that Wisconsin Main Street is celebrating 20 years of Downtown revitalization? On May 22 the Wisconsin Main Street Program will host the 20th Anniversary Gala and 18th Annual Awards Reception at Monona Terrace in Madison. The event will be an opportunity for volunteers to share the accomplishments achieved across the state since the first Main Street communities were selected in 1988. The annual award announcements are a highlight for each community and a wonderful opportunity to share ideas and celebrate the projects, people and businesses involved. Would you like to attend? Contact Kathy Wellsandt at 234-5117 for additional information.

Rice Lake celebrates 17 years as a Wisconsin Main Street community.

The Customer-Service Bar Continues to Rise!

How Does Your Customer Perceive Your Commitment and Caring?

Some successful service strategies:

1. Knowing that customers buy basically two things: good feelings and solutions to problems.

2. The rewarded customer buys, recommends to others, and returns. Reward the customer by being prompt, polite, prepared and professional.

3. When appropriate or possible, call your customer by name. Give them your undivided attention and treat each customer as if he/she is the most important person you have served that day.

4. Remember that everything your customer sees, feels, hears, or smells will shape his/her opinion of you and your business. Boost return sales by careful attention to these details.

5. Having the answer or knowing where to get answers is critically important to a customer. Offer intelligent recommendations, alternatives, and assurances.

6. Give your customer a little something extra just for being your customer. Sometimes loyalty can be gained with a small “bonus.”

7. The customer wants results-reasons are less acceptable than solutions.

8. Learn to build value so that dollars are not always the issue.

9. A customer has many choices as to where their dollars can be spent. Provide the justification and solid perception that your business offers the best choice.

Knowing how to win and keep customers is the single most important sales skill we can learn. Courtesy of Shop Talk

Why Support Local Merchants?
By Roger Frank Bass, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 3-8-08

First, about the toaster. About 25 years ago, my wife and I lived in Spring Green, a town of about 1,000 located 45 miles west of Madison. Our toaster broke, and I priced them locally at a hardware store and in Madison. Predictably, the chains beat the locals and I saved $1.35 at J.C. Penney. Because we were living on teachers’ salaries, economizing was a virtue and afforded me a chance to feel smug and responsible at the same time.

Now, about my brain. Like many, I have vasovagal syncope, which involves an overly active cranial nerve that results in lightheadedness and fainting. It’s not dangerous and often goes away when the triggers, such as stress, have been removed.

Following a fainting bout, my wife called Spring Green EMTs, who promptly rendered assistance, loaded me onto a gurney and rode with me to University Hospitals in Madison. All I remember is that the person who arrived first and shouldered the bulk of the load carrying me out was the owner of the hardware store and whose toaster would have cost me $1.35 more.

A guilt-induced investigation found that the hardware store owner also coached Little League and a girls softball team and was a member of the Lions Club that sponsored our summer children’s festival. His wife ran the Cub Scout troop, and he let students paint his store’s windows for homecoming. Later, when I was teaching high school special education, he agreed to sponsor work-study students. The list goes on.

To conclude that we sometimes should pay more to buy from local, small-scale merchants because they provide additional services to the community would miss the point. We should support them because a flourishing community isn’t a financial entity. A community runs on loyalty; it’s about two-way relationships, not whether a toaster costs $1.35 more. Anyone skeptical of that argument should call Mr. J.C. Penney or the Wal-Mart world headquarters and see how fast they show up when you need a ride to the hospital.

When small businesses close because big-box wholesalers have made the interstate Main Street, we are looking at more than a business trend; we are looking at a societal event that says something troubling about what we mean to each other.

A community is more than a group of people looking for a deal; it’s a group of people looking out for each other.