What kind of retail business would you like to see in the former Arensberg’s Shoes space? / LJWorld.com

Asked at Massachusetts Street on February 27, 2010

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“Some sort of specialty store, a clothing store or a toy store.”

— Ken Campbell, business owner, Lawrence

“I’d like to see a nice clothing store for teenagers, something more trendy.”

— Jillian Watson, LHS senior, Lawrence

“A Build-A-Bear store.”

— Jenna Gaston, Langston Hughes first-grader, Lawrence

“I’d like to see an upscale clothing store catering to the Boomers”

— Blaine Allmond, jeweler, Pittsburg

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beatrice 4 years, 1 month ago

glock, a gun store. Would that be the place where people store their guns until they are needed by the militia? I'm with ya -- who would ever want to keep those things in their home?

(sorry, couldn't resist)

paulette2 4 years, 1 month ago

Oread Cafe?

gl0ck0wn3r 4 years, 1 month ago

How about a gun store?

paulette2 4 years, 1 month ago

P.F. Changs & Sweet Tomato (salad bar)

educatedintheusa 4 years, 1 month ago

An affordable grocery which accepts WIC and includes fresh produce and family basics, such as diapers and TP.

Multidisciplinary 4 years, 1 month ago

Taco Grande..with over the sidewalk drive thru food delivery.

Menazort 4 years, 1 month ago

A medical marijuana dispensary would be ideal, presuming we lived in a sane, rational, society respectful of individual freedom.

gl0ck0wn3r 4 years, 1 month ago

How about something the market can support?

boltzmann 4 years, 1 month ago

All the people who requested Trader Joe's should go to their website and put in a "location request" - maybe we can use people power to bring one here!

beatrice 4 years, 1 month ago

Something about an Edamame Emporium, and finding a humorous connection between your pickle and ring businesses. I guess putting both business names in the same sentence was a bit too much.

You could get the Jolly Green Giant to advertise both businesses as well.

boltzmann 4 years, 1 month ago

Trader Joe's definitely! However, our idiotic Kansas laws would keep them from selling Two Buck Chuck! :(

Free the Grapes!

Isabelle~ I'm not sure a furniture store could make it in Lawrence. What kind of stuff are you thinking of? With the recent closure of Blue Heron, which stocked unique, higher-end items, it would seem that furniture might be a hard sell downtown. I'd love to see one, too--just not sure it would work.

Bea~Whatever did you say to get pinked?

paulette2 4 years, 1 month ago

Room & Board + Trader Joe's

milkman_dan 4 years, 1 month ago

A nice colonic spa certainly would be a special addition to downtown. We'll throw in waxing & beaching to make it a prettier city.

Isabelle 4 years, 1 month ago

Hhmmm-this town needs a good furniture store and the Arensberg space is large enough to handle that kind of inventory. Another great idea is a clothing store that is not -that- trendy as Lawrence downtown has that area covered-too well. Not a restaurant-not a bar-umm not a toy store( we have that already...). My answers come from my thinking of what i leave Lawrence to purchase for my self and my family.

Crossfire 4 years, 1 month ago

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toe 4 years, 1 month ago

How about a free clinic for Orthodontics.

beatrice 4 years, 1 month ago

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mae 4 years, 1 month ago

Cheesecake factory would make a killing there and I don't know of ANYONE who doesn't like that place.

Richard Heckler 4 years, 1 month ago

OR bring Old Navy downtown....

Richard Heckler 4 years, 1 month ago

Lands End
Sony Style
Apple Store
Lego Store - These are stores that stock past products,new products and products that cannot be purchased anywhere else. These are great stores for all ages. The nearest one is St Louis.

BruceWayne 4 years, 1 month ago

Bong hits for Paulette!

KansasPerson 4 years, 1 month ago

Klondike Bar Emporium.

Pywacket 4 years, 1 month ago

You're right, Bea. What was I thinking?!

Instead of those rich, heartless purveyors of overpriced c***-rings and spatulas (which, of course, are manufactured by starving, blind Indonesian children), we should throw our support behind local entrepreneurs, regardless of whatever they may be lacking in the personality department.

Certainly there are some eager souls in Lawrence who could sell locally made, organic products. Certain locals whose previous endeavors have sadly failed may wish to try something new--something that won't tax their limited mental capacity.

So here's hoping Maude's Pickle-Piercing Emporium and Tom & Barry's Melon Baller Barn meet with rousing success on Mass St.

riverdrifter 4 years, 1 month ago

OK: Guy & Mae's Barbeque/Hooters/bait shop/high-end guns http://www.williamlarkinmoore.com/

That would do it. Though I would be tempted to thrown in the micro-Cabelas with a taxidermied possum.

Uhm, how much room we got to work with here?

paulette2 4 years, 1 month ago

Agree Anna. hope that the doctor is reading these pleas!

beatrice 4 years, 1 month ago

"C***-Ring Warehouse or Spatula City."

Py, I'm surprised you want more of the big, corporate box stores like those.

Anna, Trader Joe's rocks. We have one about four miles away. City life is good.

AnnaUndercover 4 years, 1 month ago

@paulette2 I am so with you on Trader Joe's! I'm dying without it. The closest one is in Missouri.

beatrice 4 years, 1 month ago

Time travel agency.

Pywacket 4 years, 1 month ago

Bea~ You just flattered the cretin.

I'd like to see either a C***-Ring Warehouse or Spatula City.... although a modest local business would be all right, too.

RoeDapple 4 years, 1 month ago

School of massage therapy???

paulette2 4 years, 1 month ago

Trader Joe's, Hardrock Cafe, Aveda Spa, and a Wine bar, something like Grape & Grain?

Multidisciplinary 4 years, 1 month ago

riverdrifter (anonymous) says...

A combination beer joint, bank and bait shop.

Everything you need.

alcohol jukebox access to cash all things wiggly you can envision skewered repeatedly at your hands : prognosis poor

You suggestin' "The Outhouse West" ?

Liberty275 4 years, 1 month ago

Strip club

RETICENT_IRREVERENT 4 years, 1 month ago

Micro Cabela's Maybe they could have one stuffed badger.

spacehog 4 years, 1 month ago

I like the gun and knife store idea, as long as there's no registration, and they should include free amphetimines with every purchase.

beatrice 4 years, 1 month ago

I'm assuming that the "40" is your IQ.

lawrenceguy40 4 years, 1 month ago

sunny - that is one of the few ways we are going to get out of barry o's mess. It won't happen under his watch though. We'll have to wait 983 days until we get the chance to vote a real American into office. I am sure barry o has only one goal - the enslavement of the American people. Some weird revenge mentality.....

paulette2 4 years, 1 month ago

orthodontist office?

puddleglum 4 years, 1 month ago

I still want a drag strip. with hookahs, beer, and ammo on the side.

sunny 4 years, 1 month ago

I would like to see the government (obamy) give tax credits to small businesses...and anyone making over $250,000

tomatogrower 4 years, 1 month ago

if it has to be a corporation, then Coldwater Creek. Otherwise, I'd like to see him make more money from the apartment rents, and charge smaller rents to a local business, so they can make a go of it.

beatrice 4 years, 1 month ago

Lemur grooming shop

The_Original_Bob 4 years, 1 month ago

Big Ass Biscuits.

dickvandyke 4 years, 1 month ago

THAT newstand kiosk thingy that Jan Pennington was talking about would just be awesome! Can we get two??????

paulette2 4 years, 1 month ago

Trader Joe's, Hard Rock Cafe, and an Aveda spa & salon!

CWGOKU 4 years, 1 month ago

How about a shoe store... Or a gun, liquor, lingerie store. One stop shopping. Glad to see you survived your birthday Spacehog!

toe 4 years, 1 month ago

He can build what ever he wants, as long as I do not have to subsidize it.

militant 4 years, 1 month ago

OK, if the suggestion for a gun range/store wasn't appreciated, we can always put in a Hooters. I not suggesting this for myself because I'm a non-sexist...I'm only thinking of others...I'm a giver.

Donnuts 4 years, 1 month ago

Grocery store.

sunny 4 years, 1 month ago

Put in there what ever you can afford.

autie 4 years, 1 month ago

I'll go with the bait/beer/ammo concept. and all the employees are Hooters girls.

lawrenceguy40 4 years, 1 month ago

A gun and knife store. There is not a gun store in town, but we need one bad.

riverdrifter 4 years, 1 month ago

A combination beer joint, bank and bait shop.

Everything you need.

The_Original_Bob 4 years, 1 month ago

Red Lobster, Italian Gardens, Applebees, Ruby Tuesday, Chilis, or Carl's jr.

BruceWayne 4 years, 1 month ago

a pawn shop or computer recycling center. both sure fire, no fail ventures.

RETICENT_IRREVERENT 4 years, 1 month ago

Geesh, Welcome in the day properly...

tanaumaga 4 years, 1 month ago

massage parlor....i can see it the storefront now....happy ending

remember_username 4 years, 1 month ago

I think a firearm store or pawn shop would be hilarious. Better yet a store selling dehumidifiers on one side of the store and humidifiers on the other side of the store, cuckoo clocks on both walls - call the store "Partisanship is Hours".

dajudge 4 years, 1 month ago

A homeless shelter and soup kitchen.

thebcman 4 years, 1 month ago

i think we could use another bar downtown.

paulette2 4 years, 1 month ago

Trader Joe's and a Hardrock Cafe!

Multidisciplinary 4 years, 1 month ago

The Bohemian Buskerhawk Juggling, one man band set ups, tube balloons,hats, costumes, unicycles, trick ropes and stilt shop. Maybe some of that old stuff from John's Novelty.

Free " Support your local Buskerhawk" donation cup, donated by packer, with each purchase. Discounts for shelter inhabitants. Maybe other shops could offer 'busker cash redeemable coupons' for people who sweep the sidewalk. If they're going to be downtown, let's encourage a good performance that they can feel good about.

spacehog 4 years, 1 month ago

“I’d like to see an upscale clothing store catering to the Boomers”

Yeah....Let's do something nice for the self-absorbed Baby Boomers. The losers that always watched "30-Something" and are now sucking up all the Social Security and Medicare Benefits that I'll never see.

"I'm speaking for all of us. I'm the spokesman for a generation." -Bob Dylan, and Spacehog

spacehog 4 years, 1 month ago

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spacehog 4 years, 1 month ago

Wal-Mart. Or a good Head Shop. Maybe bring back 7th Heaven.

Deja Coffin 4 years, 1 month ago

Any kind of store that I won't go to. The less reasons I have to walk around Mass. the better. Sorry.

TheBigW 4 years, 1 month ago

We need a good night club in downtown one where you can hear some good live music and get tanked, maybe make it a topless club too.

parrothead8 4 years, 1 month ago

A full-time local farmer's market.

phoggyjay 4 years, 1 month ago

A medical marijuana dispensary... it's about time people.

Zachary Stoltenberg 4 years, 1 month ago

I don't know that my budget could handle a Trader Joe's, I'd be there all the time!

pandazrule 4 years, 1 month ago

YES!! Trader Joe's!

demonfury 4 years, 1 month ago

Give it to Loring Henderson to house more homeless. We don't have enough of them now, we need more, lot's more. You see Loring want's to help everyone who is homeless, stay homeless. He says he doesn't, but the way his shelter functions, he does. He welcomes them in even if they are drunk or doped to the gills. He loves them. He's not concerned about public safety, or the safety of others at the shelter. If he was, he wouldn't let the drunks in every night, but he does. He really just wants to make sure they are treated to hot meals, warm beds, internet and job searching tools, support services, and whatever else they need. I pay handsomely for all of that, but he want's to give it to those drunks that show up every night, that in all actuality, don't want to fend for themselves when it's all handed to them freely. These bums are on Mass St. all day long now, so why not give them this location so they don't have to leave Mass St. to go and get their free meals, or booze, or drugs for that matter? Lawrence is all about glamorizing it's diversity, and open liberalism. Here's their best opportunity to do both. Let's put the homeless center stage, smack dab in the middle of downtown for all to enjoy. And by all means, please take some more of my tax dollars to make this happen. What a joke. I'm sure that the braindead leaders of this city will collaborate to make sure the new tennants offer something we don't need, probably don't want, and will sell it at an exorbinate price tag, thereby keeping pace with the rest of downtown. And the city wonders why it too is in decline.