The Downtown Desert

The+Downtown+Desert

Angel West, Staff Writer

Is downtown Gaffney simply a diamond in the rough or is it a desert of despair? Nobody really knows because nobody goes downtown for anything, unless you’re driving through to get somewhere else or for any parade. Even then, nobody looks in or around the local businesses. Downtown Gaffney recently received an escape room, and the Con Cafe II previously in the last couple of months. It also has an ice cream shop, antique stores, a pharmacy, a tire shop, plenty of tax places, a sandwich shop, a restaurant, Gaffney Little Theater (GLT), The Chronicle, The Capri on Main, and Harold’s. Many people visit GLT and Harold’s because those are the most known in our little town, but not many people go to the other small, local businesses.

One small local business owner, Shane Trotter, owner of the Con Cafe II. Shane has stated, “the original Con Cafe is busy, but the one downtown is not so much. The reason it’s not so busy is because nobody enjoys Downtown Gaffney like they should.” Shane has tried to bring more local business to his downtown location by starting up Bikes on Limestone: A Social Experiment. Trotter has a goal to have a weekly social gathering event, the first one was on Thursday February 22, 2018. The turn out wasn’t that great because not many knew about it.  There is so many interesting things downtown that could actually bring our little town of Gaffney alive, but because we’re not as flashy as Downtown Spartanburg, Greenville, or Charlotte, not a single soul will willingly go to the Downtown Gaffney area. The business owners of all of the places in downtown should reach out to the city of Gaffney either through ads or social media pages. Getting people to come downtown is a two way street. Business owners have to advertise as well as people have to support local businesses.

People of Gaffney need to do is start supporting their own town. Gaffney citizens have got to start going downtown, going to city hall meetings, interacting with the youth of the city to get them interested in going to downtown instead of driving all the way to Spartanburg and so on. We will never grow if we never try. Everyone here lately has talked about how bad Gaffney has gotten over the past couple of months, but are not willing to make any kind of changes. Gaffney could be one of those small towns you hear about in songs if we were to stop caring about how we portrayed ourselves to the public and started enjoying ourselves and downtown.