Locke Street
 

Street to un-Locke potential Plan under way

Lisa Grace Marr
The Hamilton Spectator
(Dec 15, 2007)

By next summer, Locke Street will offer even more to the discerning shopper and restaurant connoisseur.

That's the promise of Tony Greco, Locke Street BIA's chair. To help fulfill that promise, the city has hired a consultant to help the fledgling BIA with a marketing strategy and development plan.

But already there are signs the commercial district is growing: bright red banners herald the BIA's entrances, new storefronts are going up and properties are in the midst of being bought and sold and renovated.

In addition, property owners between Alexander and Melbourne streets have expressed an interest in joining the BIA. Greco said he hopes to have a meeting to discuss extending the BIA boundaries in a few weeks.

David Bernstein is convinced there's no better street than Locke. The 26-year-old entrepreneur is opening a new cafe in January.

The Courtyard will offer fair trade and organic coffees and espressos, muffins and crepes for the early-morning takeaway crowd. Much of the food served at the restaurant, beside the Gallery on Locke, will be made with ingredients from Bernstein's family farm in Flamborough.

Bernstein's optimistic, even though there are already about three other cafes down the street and strengthening rumours about java king Starbucks locating in the old Robert David store.

"It's the nicest street in Hamilton to do something like this."

Starbucks rumours have swirled for weeks but yesterday a spokesperson with the company said nothing could be confirmed without a signed lease agreement.

Greco, owner of Mister Tony's hair salon, said his understanding is that Starbucks' arrival on Locke is imminent, and he thinks there's lots of room for everyone. Bernstein agrees.

"Starbucks will appeal to the after-six crowd. We're not concerned about a Starbucks." He said the street has a mix of stores and restaurants that makes it a great place to do business.

"It's like a mall but more natural ... it's got great shops, antiques ... all the things that keep people coming back."

I hate shopping, but I can spend an hour or two looking around on Locke.

yup...good news of another organic/fair trade cafe. that makes 3. Bad Dog, Main Desserts and this new one.
Anyone know what is going into the house that had the huge reno across from Green Monkey?

The owner/staff at Locke Street Bakery have comfirmed with me that Starbucks is indeed going in that stainless-steel store (formerly David Something Clothiers).

They are not concerned and KNOW they will loose no business to Starbucks.
LSB offers about a million more things than Starbucks.
Their coffee (Seatle's Best), is actually owned by Starbucks... oddly enough (I learned that from LSB staff yesterday).

this new place, The Courtyard - will it have a courtyard patio out back I wonder?? would be sweet if they do.

Don't Fear Starbucks
Why the franchise actually helps mom and pop coffeehouses.

http://www.slate.com/id/2180301/?GT1=10837

I don't fear them for Locke or anywhere....it's actually a very boring, predictable place with bad coffee.
Look at My Dog Joe in Westdale...one block from Second Cup and their booming away. I will never need to sit in that stuffy second cup again.

This is an interesting article, although I think any fear associated with Starbucks isn't with them, but with the rest of the corporate fast food, chain places that like to follow them around ruining once-cool neighbourhoods. Hopefully we don't see that on Locke.

The fact that Starbucks may actually be considering Locke Street should also be interpreted as a good sign in that even with its huge expansion, the chain is still fairly selective with where it places shops. Maybe it finally has some confidence in Hamilton, where it is currently virtually non-existent.

As an aside, there is an intersection in Vancouver at which Starbucks has a location on three of the four corners --- I once heard (although I am not sure how reliable the source was) that they were considering placing a shop on the fourth one as well!

Damn, I thought only Tim Hortons did such silly things.

There's a Starbucks at Ancaster, the Mountain and Stoney Creek.

on the exterior, it would appear that starbucks expansion has been fairly indiscriminate but they're quite selective. when they find a city or neighbourhood they like they saturate it. once the competition has fallen by the wayside they close the underperforming locations. that hasn't happened in hamilton yet. probably not the best market for starbucks what with hortons stranglehold on the market.

Exactly.

London, Ontario has eleven Starbucks stores.

NYC has a billion. I think Starbucks is more into land speculation than coffee there.

the Bad Dog did some minor reno work during Christmas.
Looks amazing now. This is the type of reno I was expecting from the Westdale Second Cup.
Go check it out next time you're on Locke. Fabulous job.

I think it's only two... but it's still rediculous! hahah

http://www.gergltd.com/users/isaac.g...images/sas.jpg
http://www.gergltd.com/users/isaac.g...images/sas.jpg

Great pic. That actually isn't the intersection I was thinking of! That's Robson and Thurlow. I was thinking of Granville and Georgia, where there are two outlets and one very close by. I think I remember someone counting seven stores within a two square block region in that area. That is just how crazily concentrated Vancouver is with Starbucks outlets.

It was a huge culture shock coming to a place that had Tim Hortons on every corner rather than Starbucks!

It must have been quite a shock, leaving behind all that shallow pretence and coming to a city deeply enriched with centuries of musical and visual artistic talent! Don't worry, you'll get used to living in a city with real people and real talent!:D

The number of Starbucks does not measure the level of culture in a city - just the level of disposable income available to be wasted on overpriced whipped hot milk drinks garnished with a dash of coffee!

lol....'starbucks measuring the level of culture in a city'??

anyone who looks at life like that has some problems.
it's no different than hortons or mcdonalds or pizza pizza. sameness, boring, crappy product, cookie cutter etc.... like suburban sprawl.

The word 'culture' shouldn't even be used in the same sentence....at least not in the way you were using it. it'll be used in the future when people go through the archives of the once-powerful West and say "what kind of idiotic culture was this??"

Wow, I see the "hate" of the week is Starbucks. Starbucks will do great on Locke and the places that are already there will continue to do great. Starbucks may well drive foot traffic and that can only be to everyone's benefit.

I don't actually think anyone suggested the per capita Stabucks rate co-related to a cities cultural richness, did they?

Holding my adopted hometown of Windsor up as an example--Starbucks and TH can co-exist quite nicely. Windsor is a very TH centered city--they blitzed the city with locations in the 1990s--but Starbucks has come in and opened up a half dozen or so stores and is doing well also. Plenty of room for everyone to co-exist so long as people need their fix.

I don't think anyone has a 'hate on' for starbucks.
mark was being more sarcastic than anything in his comments (as I read them), yet he's right...there are probably people who measure the 'sophistication' of a city based on how often they can buy expensive cups of whipped cream and suger.
it's pretty funny imo.