In September, La Jolla Village Merchants Association (LJVMA) Business Improvement District (BID) unveiled results of a new business survey indicating a community desire for more restaurants, as well as plans for Pillage The Village annual children’s Halloween festival.
Board members Elsie Arredondo, Brett Murphy and Ike Fazzio from LJVMA’s Economic Development Division jointly gave a presentation on results of a recent survey of local residents, online and in-person, asking them what types of new businesses are needed in La Jolla’s downtown Village.
“We’ve been working this past year on this special campaign, the goal of which is to bring new business to the Village to make it really thrive,” said Arredondo. “We wanted to look at the gap between what businesses we do have, and what we could add.”
Arredondo noted the survey showed “a high demand for (more) restaurants. People indicated they wanted healthier restaurant options, more retail shopping and a grocery store.”
Pointing out tourism is important during the summer, while noting that is a brief window, Arredondo added, “We truly believe we can bring our locals in to support our businesses, and that they can thrive in our environment.”
Fazzio gave a slideshow noting “there’s a lot of higher-end income in this area of La Jolla.”
“We need quantitative data, really hard numbers, to give us an idea of what La Jolla needs right now,” said Murphy adding, “It’s a work in progress, a living document. I think it (survey) is a great start.”
Fazzio suggested information gleaned from the LJVMA business survey could be used by commercial real estate brokers to target those businesses the community wants to see come to the downtown Village.
“We have to keep talking about it,” said LJVMA board member James Niebling. “The more it develops … great things are going to come out of it.”
LJVMA executive director Sheila Fortune said Pillage the Village, the community’s sixth annual kid’s Halloween party, falls on a Monday this year. Fortune also let the cat out of the bag in revealing “we’re considering adding a haunted house.” She added it might be possible to extend the one-day spooky holiday observance turning it into a weekend-long event.
“The La Jolla Real Estate Brokers Association (REBA) wants to continue to participate allowing us (BID) to use their facility for the costume contest,” noted board member Claudette Berwin.
LJVMA meets the second Wednesday of the month at 3 p.m. at La Jolla Riford Library, 7555 Draper Ave.