Reviving downtown Bryan
by BILL HUGHES
Downtown Bryan has been
in a state of flux.
Some businesses are leav
ing for greener pastures in
College Station, while other
merchants see the downtown
area as green pastures for
their types of stores.
The big change has been
the increasing number of
businesses flowing into the
downtown area, rather than
out of it.
In the past, as the popula
tion grew in College Station,
merchants moved out of
downtown Bryan to be closer
to the larger consumer base
south of Bryan.
But the trend reversed
slightly in 1984 when 14 new
businesses opened their doors
downtown. Only four had
opened in 1983.
The downtown revival ef
fort is following a pattern de
scribed in “The Rebels of Ret
ail,” the cover story in the
November 1985 issue of Inc.
magazine, in which small
business owners pick market
ing niches composed of peo
ple willing to go out of their
way to reach places appealing
to special interests.
The influx of new busi
nesses includes stores appeal
ing to artists and crafstmen,
restaurants, designers, doc
tors, attorneys and other spe
cialty merchants.
The revival is so young that
until recently, there hadn’t
been a concentrated effort to
get the various parties in
volved with downtown Bryan
to coordinate their plans.
In 1983, Ed Latta, exec
utive director of the Bryan
Development Foundation,
began meeting with down
town businesspeople. The
foundation had been created
by the city of Bryan to en
hance the economic devel
opment of the community;
Latta decided the downtown
area needed some additional
help from the foundation.
Latta felt that downtown
Bryan could serve some
needs that weren’t being
served elsewhere in the com
munity, such as being an “in-
The revival effort in down
town Bryan is still young; it
hasn’t taken hold in the
whole area. The facade for
Donna’s Ceramics has been
redone (top photo), yet
scenes like the one at left ex-
cubator” for new businesses
that need to keep overhead
low to make a go of it in their
first and second years.
“What we’ve tried to ac
complish is to create an atmo
sphere for growth down
town,” he says. “We feel that
we’ve marketed downtown to
folks who are looking for
some good structures to move
into, folks who produce or of
fer something different than
can be found in a mall.”
In late 1983, the Bryan
Downtowners Association was
formed through Latta and
the development foundation.
The immediate goal was to
improve the economic status
of the downtown area.
The association began
sponsoring festivals, such as
Westfest and Heritage Days,
to increase awareness about
the downtown area. The festi
vals were successful, says
Wendy Marshall, coordinator
of the Bryan Downtowners
Association, but a lot more
needs to be done.
“The association has never
provided the city with any
kind of comprehensive plan
about downtown,” she says.
“That kind of information is
helpful for them in making
any decisions.”
Marshall, who’s been on
the job for four months, is in
the midst of a reorganization
effort that she hopes will
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