Downtown Morgan Hill will celebrate Small Business Saturday and the beginning of the holiday season with festive “street scenes” in front of Monterey Road businesses.
The one-day parklet project will allow businesses and organizations to transform a dozen on-street parking spots on Monterey Road, between Second and Third streets, into “lively street scenes,” according to Morgan Hill Economic Development Manager Edith Ramirez.
Examples of the street scenes to decorate downtown Morgan Hill for the event include Santa Claus stations, art galleries and outdoor lounges.
The effort was launched by the Tourism Alliance, which has developed an “ideas book” identifying more than 70 strategies of how to promote Morgan Hill as a tourism destination, City staff said.
The purpose of the parklet project is not only to decorate the downtown, but also to encourage residents and visitors to shop local and support downtown businesses.
“It’s like performance art for the downtown,” said Brad Jones, co-owner of BookSmart on Depot Street. “It’s going to attract people, and get them to look around and do some prospecting here.”
The downtown scene project is sponsored by the City of Morgan Hill and the Morgan Hill Downtown Association.
The parklet event will take place from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, which happens to be Small Business Saturday – a counter and follow-up to Black Friday which marks the unofficial beginning to the winter holiday shopping season.
The nationwide Small Business Saturday shopping campaign encourages people to shop locally and from small, independent retailers for their holiday needs. Jones, who is president of the MHDA, explained that when residents shop at their local independent stores, up to three times more of the money from their purchases remains in the local community than if the money were spent at big-box chain stores.
“There’s a lot of reasons to support small businesses because they give back to the community in ways that no big-box store has even dreamt of,” Jones said. “The people who own small businesses are part of your church, or your service organization, and without those people a lot of good wouldn’t happen in your community.”
City staff also announced Wednesday that the City is participating in the “100 percent local campaign” to help promote Morgan Hill’s locally made food products such as premium wines and pick-your-own fruit farms.
The local campaign is in partnership with the Santa Clara County Farm Bureau and the Wineries of Santa Clara County, according to a press release from City Hall.
Those who create and sell local products can participate in the local campaign by signing up at www.morganhill.ca.gov, and list their companies and products for residents and visitors who want to buy local and promote agri-tourism in Morgan Hill, City staff said.
These efforts and more are part of a heightened focus by the City in recent years to promote tourism and economic development in Morgan Hill.
“Increasing tourism is one of the economic development goals for the City,” Ramirez said. “However, even though we have all the amenities that a weekend getaway would offer, many people don’t know about these great amenities. This creates a tremendous opportunity to brand the City as the perfect weekend destination and as an alternative to the wine regions up north.”
