The next downtown merchant meeting is Tuesday, January 17, at 8:30 a.m. at Uptown Art.

The next Merchant/Business Meeting is Tuesday, January 17, at 8:30 a.m. at Uptown Art (426 Bank Street) in New Albany.

Following are December meeting minutes, as forwarded by Develop New Albany.

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December Merchant/Business Meeting

Thanks to Stacey for hosting this month’s meeting.

14 in attendance

Jingle walk was discussed, the event is always the Saturday after Thanksgiving which also small business Saturday. This year we had about 580 people attended. Positive feedback was brought up at the meeting. A lot of people were out and a lot of the merchants had customers come back the week after the Jingle walk and purchase additional items. All merchants at meeting felt like they had higher sales that day because of the Jingle Walk event. Some of the owners shared they had doubled and one almost tripled sales from previous year. Also discussed that the Beer garden was a great addition and it will hopefully grow each year. Next year it may go back to Pearl Street for registration due to large crowds registering. Thanks to the City for always adding things each year to enhance our Downtown, added lighting was great.

Old Time Christmas was a big success. This year we didn’t have much time to organize but we will be discussing and planning in the next couple of weeks for next year. We received great press for the event. Thanks to Michelle (Mariposa) for getting the Carolers from New Albany High School, they were wonderful. We also had the Corydon Dulcimer Society and Santa. Apparently one of the sites (wasn’t anything we put out) said we were having a horse drawn carriage and we didn’t so we had a couple of people looking for that. Some suggestions from the meeting, have Carolers competition between the schools including Providence, Christian academy, etc. Kate with the Tourism is going to give us contacts to a lady that is connected to Jane Austin group, they have events where they dress in Victorian outfits. Dress & Dwell had Selfies with Santa, fun. Have Santa, Carolers and other musical events in all areas of the Downtown. Anyone know who the Santa's are that drive a train through town? If you want to be in on the planning let Teresa know so you can be included in the meetings. The date of next year will be December 9th. It was also suggested having shorter time, maybe noon to 5 or 6 pm. Thanks to Develop New Albany for sponsoring this year for the Old Time Christmas and next year we hope to have additional Sponsors to help us add more things..

It would be nice to have something every weekend to draw people to our area. Possible merchants offer same discount, turn receipts in for a special drawing, punch card type deal for prizes, use social media likes and shares for drawings too. We will also work on this with the Old Fashioned Christmas committee.

Apparently a couple of shops are interested in having some kind of a Valentine's Day event. Style show was mentioned. If you are interested in this let us know and let’s get a committee together for this and make it happen.

Develop New Albany will be hosting the Be local expo again this year. It will be on March 7th at the Elks Club. Save the date and more information will be coming soon.

Michelle ask if anyone would be interested in a social media class. She has a young lady that would do one for us for a small fee. If interested let Michelle know.

Julie's on January 24th at Purdue a free cyber security class. Later in the year she will have a banker talking about the chip readers and how you are liable.

Inner springs told us about some events, specials they have going on this s year. They are also having a retreat.

Other things discussed:

Michelle and Yvonne both use frequent shoppers cards and feel they are a successful tool for merchants.

410 Bakery opens officially tomorrow, let’s welcome them to the neighborhood.

Lady Tron will be opening in January, soups and salads.

The Petry Hedden building is going to be an interactive kitchen with local owners, 3 way liquor license.

Apartment should start moving in starting in January. . We will put a welcome packet together for new neighbors with shop information, restaurant menus, coupons, etc. Drop off your coupons or info to Develop New Albany’s office so we can put these together for the apartments and for when we have groups come in town.

Tolling starts on the 30th and with 2 way street conversion will bring different patterns. Be prepared and Take advantage of new people

City has updates on road closures on their website

Merry Christmas and happy New Year!