Businesses in the Beach can’t stay afloat
While commercial vacancy rate in the area rises, shops just north on the Danforth continue to grow
While high rents may have led to empty storefronts aplenty in the Beach, new businesses continue to spring up just north on the Danforth.
Dozens of properties which once housed grocery stores, restaurants and shops now display “for rent” signs in the windows along Queen St. E between Woodbine and Victoria Park Aves.
The commercial vacancy rate in the area has risen from about 4 per cent to 10 per cent during the past five to seven years, according to Suzanne Beard, chair of the Beach Village BIA. She said more than 30 of the 300-plus commercial properties currently sit empty.
“I think everybody would agree it’s an issue,” Beard said. “Some of it is lack of market research on the part of a retailer who’s going in. But by the same token, perhaps landlords who are looking to capitalize on market values should consider that perhaps now, that’s not going to happen.”
Ken Galbraith has owned Buds Coffee Bar at the corner of Queen St. and Elmer Ave. since 2014. But with his rent set to double from its current rate of $3,000 per month under a new landlord, he’s now looking to relocate.
“We make a living with the current rent but doubling with no improvements would just eat the whole profit,” Galbraith said. “The Beach is a great place to do business, it’s just some landlords are greedy and they do want to get the most they can and they don’t care if their space is empty because they’re waiting for, say, a big corporation to come in.”
Galbraith’s current landlord Harold Weisfeld has owned Ends, a discount clothing store, since 1982. Having sold his Beach properties, Weisfeld is retiring and closing up next month.
He said rents in the neighbourhood have “gone crazy,” but that’s not the only reason so many businesses are struggling to stay afloat.
“Number one: online, online, online,” Weisfeld said. “The traffic isn’t there like it used to be. People are using online, especially younger people.”
Whereas Ends might have brought in $10,000 on a typical Saturday five years ago, Weisfeld said he made about a fifth of that last Saturday.
“There’s no people,” he said. “A few come here on a Saturday, where you used to see it jammed. It’s a great area . . . but it just isn’t what it was. The last five years have been very hard.”
But not far from the Beach, the past halfdecade has been very different for local businesses.
The Danforth’s vacancy rate has dropped to just 6 per cent from 17 per cent in 2012, according to Oliver Hierlihy, manager of the Danforth Mosaic BIA, which serves the area that spans from Jones to Westlake Aves., along the Danforth.
“The Danforth was kind of a forgotten neighbourhood for a while,” said Hierlihy. “What’s really happened is you have a number of businesses who are looking for a reasonable rent, a place where they can open up their mom and pop shop and they found Danforth.”
Michelle Belisle, owner of Sauce on the Danforth, a bar just west of Monarch Park Ave., recalled opening five years ago when there was little else to do in the neighbourhood.
“We were kind of first on the block to open up,” said Belisle, also vice-chair of the BIA.
She said cheap rent at the time and being along the subway line made it an easy choice to move in. “This block that we’re on was much less developed 10 years ago. There really wouldn’t be a reason to come on this block,” she said. “In terms of foot traffic, there’s definitely more people from other areas of the city that are coming to this block and that probably is in large part to all the other businesses that have opened since we opened. There’s more for people to choose from.”
The average cost to rent a commercial property is about $2,500 per month, according to Gay Stephenson, a board member of the Dan- forth East Community Association.
Stephenson cites another major reason for the neighbourhood’s success. Five years ago, as dozens of storefronts sat empty, the community association began a pop-up shop project to fill them with temporary businesses at a discounted rent cost.
“These new businesses were often starting up, (owners were) moving the business from online or just had a new idea to try out and wanted to test the market,” she said.
Volunteers would clean up and beautify the spaces, where new businesses would move in anywhere from a weekend to six months.
Stephenson said the hope was that these businesses would stay on permanently. Some, like The Handwork Department, a handmade and vintage goods store, did just that.
“This neighbourhood, when we were opening, didn’t really have very many interesting little shops,” said Maggie Krawczyk, owner of the store. “Mostly it was just coffee shops and bars, nothing really very fun.”
Krawczyk said she initially planned to stay open for three months in 2015, but decided to stay, having moved a couple doors down, because of the new opportunities that the Danforth East presents as it continues to grow.
“People don’t really think of the Danforth as being a cool place to shop,” she said.
“The Danforth is how you get to where you’re going. We’re trying to make something here where people can shop and enjoy the neighbourhood.
“The other stores kind of help to bring more diverse crowds to even our store. It’s becoming more of a community, I’d say.”