Saturday, November 28, 2020
Q&A with Two Local Businesses Below:
Mo’s Wine & Spirits:
Q&A with Maureen Abrahamson from Mo’s Wine & Spirits
How long has Mo’s been a part of the small business community in Fairfield?
Almost 18 years! My husband and I are the owners and actually my husband has a background in food and beverage and I have a business background so our skill sets merged nicely. We owned a small restaurant in Darien and sold that and in the same month we opened Mo’s. I love this town. There’s everything here. Enormous diversity. It’s a dynamic small town feeling in a larger setting. People come from all over the place to see what small businesses in Fairfield are doing.
What is it about being a part of the small business community in Fairfield that gives your job so much more meaning, satisfaction, and intimacy than it might otherwise?
There’s a couple of things that go hand in hand with that - Fairfield is a community. We have each other’s back. We have a small business Buy Local committee and it’s been really key to keeping us all working in this crazy time of COVID. It makes it such a cohesive environment. By being a small business, we’re supporting local jobs.
What makes Mo’s a special place for the residents of Fairfield to frequent?
You know the whole COVID experience has rocked our socks. We completely shut down for 9 weeks with curbside pickup only. It was pretty scary in March and April. There were so many unknowns. What this showed me is that what people were, and are, craving is true connection. And what a small business does is create that sense of community and connection. That’s what it’s all about. That’s it. It wasn’t even about getting their wine or beer, it was about our customers seeing us and us seeing them. People need to see people right now - people they know that are a part of their community. That’s how you get to know what’s going on in your community. You know these people. I was a customer’s kid’s Brownie leader and my husband was another’s basketball coach. It’s in our best interest to make this town great because we live here. And we love this town.
Tell me about your customers - your regulars?
It’s everybody. Everybody from a single beer after work up to a few hundred dollar bordeaux or that great bottle of champagne to toast a graduation or wedding. Our demographic is quite diverse - like our town - which is another thing that makes our town so special. Most of our customers are regulars. I want people to feel good. I want people to be welcomed and get what they want at the price point they want. I want them to feel good about themselves. It’s just hugely important to keep these small businesses alive. The thing I keep thinking about is connection. You don't get that when you order online. You don’t get the same sense of intimacy and unity. I’m really, really hoping that for this holiday season our town will rally around our small businesses. Shop local. Buy local.
Why are small businesses so important to Fairfield?
For every $100 spent at a national online retailer, $1 stays in the community. If you spend that same $100 at a local retailer - $63 stays in the community. Keep the money where we live, in the town that we love. It all comes back to that.
As a small business, how has Mo’s navigated this unprecedented year? What were the challenges? What were the successes?
The challenges were overcoming the fear of the unknown. The successes were my employees really stepping up to the plate. I couldn’t be more proud of them. We formed a little pod and if we didn’t have each other every day, every day to come together and work together, it would have been a far darker time. In these tough times, though, you find your nuggets of inspiration, and hope, and light, that keep you uplifted and encourage you to put one foot in front of the other. And then seeing the customers… outside the door just saying ‘thank you’. It really makes you feel good.
What is your biggest source of joy being a small business owner in Fairfield?
Oh, watching my employees grow! I could literally talk to you about this for hours. We get a 18/19 year old without a retail job before, maybe they are introverted or don’t quite know who they are or how they fit in yet, but watching them feel their success and begin feeling confident to answer and ask questions - it’s just wonderful to watch them grow into themselves.
What are you looking forward to most on this fourth year of Small Business Saturday?
Increased business? [Laughs...] I love the fact that this has become a celebratory day in the small business world and that people really seem to be embracing it. And I hope that all the other small businesses in town feel the effects of this too. Fairfield has everything. You don’t need to go anywhere else.
What are the plans for the future of Mo’s?
Go off into the sunset and retire! [Laughing…] No no no I’m just kidding… really it’s just keep doing what we’re doing. I love my store. I love my customers. I love my employees. I love my town. I’m proud to be a part of it.
HobbyTown:
Q&A with Marc Rosenblum from Hobbytown
How long has Hobbytown been a part of the small business community in Fairfield?
We’re in our 14th year here in Fairfield. I’ve lived in the Town for over 30 years and the first 15 years I worked in Manhattan, so I commuted. And while I lived here, I never felt like an integral part of the community. When I started looking for a second career I wanted to do something local. Be a part of, and give back to, the core community. Opening a business here in town seemed like a good idea. But it was challenging, and you know, most small businesses fail in their first year of operation. I decided to collaborate with a franchise company, which I felt gave me a better opportunity for success with better knowledge and expertise. Hobbytown is a national franchise but each operates independently and tailor their needs to the local business community. We were well received when we opened and have been tailoring and tweaking the needs to the community - we change with trends and the times for the people we serve.
What is it about being a part of the small business community in Fairfield that gives your job so much more meaning, satisfaction, and intimacy than it might otherwise?
In my old career I worked on big corporate projects. It was hard to - you’re like a cog in a machine - so it was hard to see the impact you had on a larger scale. But when I opened this business I could see the results and the impact on the community and my family. It was tangible. I take a lot of joy and pride in that. I see kids come into the store with their moms and dads and their faces just light up. I know I bring a lot of joy and happiness to the local community. I encourage my staff to take stock of that all the time, that what they do brings happiness to people.
There’s a fantastic team spirit among the small local businesses in Fairfield, and the Town has done a fantastic job in defending the value of local business. I feel in a small way that I’ve contributed to - and maybe even partially led - that effort. And people have started to take notice about the importance of small and local businesses. We provide a lot of good services and products to the community. So it’s good the community supports us and that we support the community.
What makes Hobbytown a special place for the residents of Fairfield to frequent?
We have a small staff. We get to know our customers and they get to know us. It’s a personal interactive experience when you come to visit as opposed to an impersonal transactional experience. We carefully curate the product selection in the store based upon what the greater community is looking for, what they’re telling us they’re looking for. So, when we look at the marketplace, we select the products very carefully.
When people walk into the store, we have something for everyone from babies to seniors and we have customers across that whole spectrum. Grandpa can come in and buy that model set for himself and get toys for the grandkids. You know, there aren’t too many stores like us where there’s something for everyone. We’re not about a cold experience. That’s what makes our store, and small businesses in this town, so, so special.
Tell me about your customers - your regulars?
We have families that are local to the area - and I don't just mean fairfield - but they are looking for interesting things for the family to do. We have hobbyists who focus on one of the hobbies we offer, model trains, model building, remote-controlled cars and trucks, model airplanes… whatever it might be. The boy scouts do a big thing with the Pine Car Derby - we help them out, you know. But then we have gamers who play card games like Magic, and until the pandemic hit we’d host Friday Night Magic tournaments in our store. When this is all over, we’ll go back to playing. And when customers give us feedback, recently some mentioned they wanted more crafting material, so hey - we made a whole section of our store dedicated to crafting material and art supplies. We hear - and are here - for you.
Why are small businesses so important to Fairfield?
When you choose a place to live - whatever characteristics you’re looking for - and I’m sure among them is the kind of access to shopping you might have, things to do, places to go... You want to live in an interesting community. Nobody wants to live in a community where it’s just residential houses and no shopping opportunities. Small shops are a place to go. A place to get what you need. They’ve really been under threat by online shopping for a while now.
When local schools want donations, they don’t contact Amazon - they contact the small businesses - ‘can we count on you to give out gift cards to our kids when they do well in school?’ We’re here for that, and we’ve been trying to educate people in the community on these facts for a few years now and I feel it’s starting to gain traction. The Shop Small program has become a national tradition. Shop small after Black Friday. Hit Walmart on Friday and shop small on Saturday. Just wonderful.
As a small business, how has Hobbytown navigated this unprecedented year? What were the challenges? What were the successes?
So yeah. Challenging year. We’ve tried to be as fluid as we can be while working within the state guidelines. We went to a curbside model and operated like that for about two months. We would bring stuff to the door. We operated like that - but it hurt. We want people inside, touching our products with their hands. Luckily, we were able to participate in the government programs that allowed us to keep operating and pay our employees. Landlords worked with us to abate some of the rent. So everybody worked together to get through it.
We reopened the store at the beginning of May. We’re hyper vigilant with cleaning and masks - we had to change our credit card system to a touch-free system. We beefed up our website so they could shop online and see our full store inventory, have it for pickup or delivery. A few weeks ago we implemented a same-day delivery system so if people don’t want to come out they don’t have to. A lot of restructuring to survive these times.We’re lucky that we sell fun. And during this period of time of the pandemic, people needed our products even more. We were in the right place at the right time, if you will.
The things we sell put people’s hands on something physical. It’s not a video game. This is real stuff. We want to show people how to build stuff. Funny story - my son, he’d always hang around the store as a kid, picking up things and inspecting them, feeling them and trying to understand them. Now he's a mechanical engineer! How about that!
What is your biggest source of joy being a small business owner in Fairfield?
I can make a living and I can also have employees that also make a living and provide for their families. And having a product that delivers happiness to people. It’s all about having fun.
What are you looking forward to most on this fourth year of Small Business Saturday?
I always look forward to a good turnout and response from the local community. It’s good to feel they’re showing a degree of support to us. We work hard all year, and it’s nice to see their support. A lot of people who work in our store are part-timers and they live in the community - and if we don’t exist, they don’t have jobs in the community, or grow as people in the real world. It’s great to see these kids grow on and up. We’re part of the fabric of the community in that respect. What are these kids gonna do if these small businesses didn’t operate around town?
What are you looking forward to most on this fourth year of Small Business Saturday?
I always look forward to a good turnout and response from the local community. It’s good to feel they’re showing a degree of support to us. We work hard all year, and it’s nice to see their support. A lot of people who work in our store are part-timers and they live in the community - and if we don’t exist, they don’t have jobs in the community, or grow as people in the real world. It’s great to see these kids grow on and up. We’re part of the fabric of the community in that respect. What are these kids gonna do if these small businesses didn’t operate around town?