The Q at Parkside

(for those for whom the Parkside Q is their hometrain)

News and Nonsense from the Brooklyn neighborhood of Lefferts and environs, or more specifically a neighborhood once known as Melrose Park. Sometimes called Lefferts Gardens. Or Prospect-Lefferts Gardens. Or PLG. Or North Flatbush. Or Caledonia (west of Ocean). Or West Pigtown. Across From Park Slope. Under Crown Heights. Near Drummer's Grove. The Side of the Park With the McDonalds. Jackie Robinson Town. Home of Lefferts Manor. West Wingate. Near Kings County Hospital. Or if you're coming from the airport in taxi, maybe just Flatbush is best.

Friday, November 27, 2015

160 Stores Nearby And You're Still Shopping On Amazon?

Not one, not six, but one hundred and sixty stores are offering discounts during Shop Local CB9's campaign to convince you that pretty much everything you need for the holidays can be found right here. You can get yer toys, yer clothes, yer knick-knacks and yer paddywacks. More info:

Nostrand Avenue Merchant's Association Facebook Page

Tomorrow is the big kick-off at CB9 headquarters on Nostrand. No reason to put off exercising your purchasing power. Stores are open and they need our support. We love our neighborhood, and this is the American way to show love. With $$$! The Flatbush Avenue Merchants are flying their freak flags high as well. Make sure to stop in a local joint for discounts and goodies.

Exposing the apparatus in po-mo style, here's the press release rather than dropping the quotes into my own post making it look like I actually went out and did an interview. Pia and Warren from CB9 and Nostrand Ave Merchants are awesome though, and I can personally vouch for their commitment to the project.



8 comments:

Anonymous said...

I always buy at least some of our gifts at Play Kids and Trafari Tribe every Christmas. More and more I really want to see things live in person before buying them and I've gotten such great help from Shelley many times in choosing the right gift for kids. Her own children have played with a lot of the board games so she knows those well, for example. The more stuff Amazon sells and by more sellers the more difficult it is for me to get good results in searches on that site, and forget internet search engines, they've become so useless that I can't even find items I search for specifically! Much less get good suggestions when I search broader terms.

I wish the "discount" stores were as great as they used to be 5-7 years ago though. They're terrible now. Way worse products at much higher prices and the customer service in many of those places is HORRIBLE. Very rude. I encountered such rudeness the last time I attempted to go into a couple of those stores that I'm never setting foot in any of them again and I used to shop in them a lot. For discounted homewares and clothing etc, big box stores are far better than these dollar stores who are stealing money from customers for cruddy junk and being mean to them on top of it. At least Target as a corp. donates money to places like the Brooklyn Museum.

elbell said...

I wish there was a list of these 160 businesses!

Anonymous said...

Agreed! Google only does so much when small businesses either are rarely listed or outdated in their listing. I would love to support more of them, but I can't just wander for a couple hours down our streets just to see what all is out there. A good catalog of these 160 stores would be wonderful.

Liz said...

Ditto! I go to the ones I know but I'm sure there are great places off my radar.

Clarkson FlatBed said...

Warren & Pia are working on it right now. Will share when I get it. So, so, many options!

Anonymous said...

There is a gift and clothing boutique at the corner of Nostrand and Maple, I forget the name of it but you can't miss it, it's on the southeast corner. She has some lovely things, a good mix, and last time I stopped by but it's been a couple years, she had hand crocheted baby sweaters in there that her mother made.

Anonymous said...

How great would it be to get a pop-up store in one of the empty storefronts with handcrafted items from locals like the one on 7th ave in Park Slope that opened a couple months ago. There must be so many Etsy people around here.

shelley said...

The Parkside Empire | Flatbush Avenue Merchant Association is working on a website/map to better promote the businesses between Parkside Avenue & Empire Boulevard. We hope it will be done by the end of February. As a resident & business owner, I'm very knowledgeable about what each store sells along Flatbush Avenue, so in the meantime feel free to stop into Play Kids (676 Flatbush Ave, corner of Westbury Ct), call (347-715-9347) or email (playkidsstore@gmail.com), I'd be happy to point you in the right direction for what you are looking to purchase.

Love the idea of the Pop-Up shop! Tafari Tribe/Tafari Cafe will be hosting a pop-up shop in their Cafe space December 11th - 20th, from talking to Sandra (co-owner), they would be interested in continuing this after the Holiday season as well.

Hosting Pop-Up shops in vacant store fronts is usually a little harder to set in motion. You would need insurance, rent, and I would est. that 99% of the vacant stores in our merchant area need quite a bit of work before you would be able to open to the public. Most landlords don't want to deal with short term leases that Pop-Up shops would need. With that in mind, I encourage anyway who is an artisan to reach out to anyone on the board of the Parkside Empire Merchant Association (my email is listed above), we're always looking for artisans for our annual street fair, and other events that we plan on hosting throughout the year.

Thank You to everyone who is making it a priority to shop local/shop small this Holiday Season!

Shelley,
Owner of Play Kids & VP of Parkside Empire | Flatbush Ave Merchant Association