Welcoming business key for main street prosperity in Slippery Rock
SLIPPERY ROCK — The vibrant campus community at Slippery Rock is always bustling and provides an uncommon feature that differentiates Slippery Rock’s Main Street from other streets in Butler County.
Businesses of all kinds welcome the pedestrian traffic that comes when the university welcomes back more than 8,400 students, faculty and staff for a new fall semester.
“We’re blessed to be able to have an economic driver like Slippery Rock University in our backyard,” said Mayor Jondavid Longo. “For nine and a half months out of the year, we have nearly 10,000 students, faculty and staff who call Slippery Rock home. They patronize our businesses and offer us labor to help grow those businesses.”
As a two-time alumnus of Slippery Rock himself, Longo said the institution is a net positive for all who live and work there.
“I can speak to the relationship between students and the permanent residents of our community because I decided to become a permanent resident,” he said. “I straddle that line because I understand how incredible it is to have a university like that be a fundamental part of life in the borough.”
Longo took office in 2018 and has been largely focused with updating public policy and reducing financial strain on everyone who lives and works in the area.
That culture switch up has seemingly opened the door for more positive outcomes and is a boost to the prosperity Slippery Rock’s Main Street has experienced in the last few years.
“We have changed the culture to be accommodating, friendly and encouraging,” said Longo, who is in the midst of his seventh year in office. “When it comes to the business climate, specifically as far as our main street, we are proud to be able to walk hand-in-hand with small business owners when they come to us.”
While modernization is inevitable for nearly every main street in the country, Slippery Rock officials have worked to handle those changes while simultaneously making sure the street maintains the quaint “hometown” feel that has attracted new residents and businesses alike.
Slippery Rock experienced the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Not long after that once-in-a-lifetime event, consumers were slammed with record-high inflation that severely undercut some of the momentum local towns had been building.
However, according to Longo, Slippery Rock’s Main Street has flourished in the face of that adversity by going in a different direction.
“I think that Slippery Rock’s Main Street has fared much better than some others through the COVID shutdowns and this economic recession and contraction that we’ve been enduring for the last four years,” he said. “While many (main streets) were closing and shuttering their businesses, Slippery Rock was actually seeing an influx of small businesses opening.”
A number of those businesses, including Elephant #8 Thai Taste, opened less than four years ago and are now thriving in what has become an area with an extensive array of shops and restaurants.
Rooster’s Coffee Bar located at 150 S. Main St. is one of the best examples of that recent success. The cozy spot has a variety of coffee, espressos, teas and pastries on its menu.
After opening in 2022 in the heart of a picturesque area near the south end of Main Street, the business is a popular spot for both residents and college students who appreciate the comforting atmosphere.
“I feel like business is up,” said Chelynne Curci-Lang, manager of Rooster’s. “It’s definitely up for us. We’ve been open for a little over two years now and every week this fall has been significantly more than the first two years. We definitely notice a change, and it feels like more people are out and about.”
Curci-Lang served as the Main Street manager for Butler Downtown and has more in-depth knowledge than most when it comes to what the street’s economic prospects will look like moving forward.
She recently became the vice president of the Slippery Rock Business Association and has seen firsthand what it takes to sustain a living with a new business on Main Street.
“We definitely hope so,” Curci-Lang said when asked if she sees the upward trend continuing. “Other business is always good for existing business. Supporting other small businesses is huge. Those sort of things are definitely reasons to keep investing in what we have going here along Main Street.”
The variety of businesses is really what consistently attracts consumers from all over the region.
“I enjoy walking up and down the street because it’s just such a nice little town,” said Margaret Smith, a local shopper. “They have everything that you could ever want as far as local shopping goes. I try to make it out here at least once a month or so.”
Rooster’s is just one notable example among a number of local businesses that have benefited from Slippery Rock University being just a short walk away.
Denny Long has worked in the tattoo business for 16 years along Main Street. After being in a partnership for eight years, he opened his own spot known as Longevity Tattoo Company about seven years ago just a few hundred feet up the road.
“We’re doing really well,” Long said. “I’m always booked up like six months to a year out. There’s always people walking outside. We’re by appointment only, so we don’t get the walk-in traffic that some of the other shops get, but it seems like everything is staying pretty steady.”
Long went as far as to say that most of the businesses actually rely on the university to balance out yearly revenue and survive in what has been at best an up-and-down economy.
“Most of the businesses wouldn’t be here without the college,” he said. “Even in the summertime, a lot of the businesses change hours because it slows down.”
“We have a really good clientele following and they tell everyone,” he said.
Slippery Rock’s Main Street is also the home to numerous community events throughout the year. The most noteworthy of those annual events is VillageFest, which has gone on for more than two decades and regularly brings in thousands of people across the region.
Town officials also helped to put together an Independence Day celebration in 2020 in the midst of the pandemic shutdown. Later that same year in October, residents from all over Butler County visited Main Street for the first Oktoberfest celebration.
Both events have successfully continued and recently celebrated five-year anniversaries. Guests at those special events and anyone who visits Main Street daily are protected by Slippery Rock’s police force, which has been expanded recently without any significant increase in tax revenue, according to Longo.
Plenty of factors go into what shapes a welcoming Main Street. Slippery Rock’s Main Street has seemingly found a combination that places it on track for future growth.
“There used to be folks in our town who were notorious for saying no or for finding reasons to say no or finding ways to put hurdles in front of people whenever they were looking to do something,” Longo said. “But if I could describe our new culture in any way, it would be this quote specifically, ‘Yes is the answer, what is your question?’”
