Back to Business – Millersburg

Main Street Millersburg

Farmhouse Frocks, a mother-daughter boutique and clothing line in Historic Downtown Millersburg, recently added a new product to their handmade, stylish clothing line — masks. So far, they have sold thousands of these, sending 20,000 masks to a New York City bank and being recognized on national news.

This is just one Main Street Millersburg business that managed to flourish during the shutdown. Other Millersburg businesses adapted their business practices to offer care packages, family meals and positive outlooks. With these practices and a country setting, Millersburg businesses have survived and thrived. 

Local Millersburg restaurants, such as Bags Sports Pub, have been offering curbside pickup and family meal packs. According to Main Street Millersburg director Judy Lamp, this has been a huge success and revealed an unfulfilled need.

“There are a lot of people wanting family meals from regular restaurants, not just Taco Bell or Pizza Hut,” she says. “They want good meals.”

Lamp also says that offering alcohol for carryout and delivery has been vital to the success and survival of some businesses. For example, Sunny Slope Winery offered wine bottles paired with local deli meats and cheese, lunch trays and wine slushies. Nine employees were hired to meet this demand, and Lamp hopes restaurants can continue to provide carry out alcohol.

With extra free time, many local businesses built and developed their online presences through working on websites or posting sales and news.

They have also used social media to support each other; Sunny Slope Winery recently encouraged people to visit Millersburg Brewing Company’s reopening on Facebook, and the brewing company in turn encouraged customers to visit Sunny Slope. This support and encouragement among the local businesses.

In addition to Sunny Slope Winery, Farmhouse Frocks had to recruit and hire more Amish families to sew masks. A new Millersburg business, Fallen Timbers, opened during quarantine and has been busy reworking floors and walls.

In Walnut Creek, Coblentz Chocolate Company created meal packages and delivered them to underprivileged local families, and Lamp herself has been delivering meal deals to hospital workers after their long shifts have finished.

Other merchants have created event packages, such as Mother’s Day and birthdays.

“That is something people have really grabbed a hold of, if they wanna send somebody a little gift,” she says. “I’ve just been thinking to myself ‘That is one less order that Amazon got.’”

As businesses reopened, Lamp says business owners implemented every order given: installing plexiglass, removing barstools, distancing tables, wearing masks, limiting people and wiping doorknobs. This compliance surprised Lamp, and she says business owners moved past every hiccup or breakdown.

“A lot of the things that (the businesses) can’t do is the things that made them special,” she says. “McKelvey’s is known to be packed, it’s loud and a Homes County favorite, and they’re not gonna be allowed to have that many people in there.”

An advantage of Millersburg businesses is its country setting. As one of the largest tourist destinations in Ohio, they were hit hard by the shutdown. But restaurants like McKelvey’s have more outdoor seating available than a city setting.

On the weekend of May 16, people were milling around downtown, sitting on propped chairs and tables outside, eating their lunches or ice cream cones in the sunny weather.

“Friday was packed,” Lamp says. “Being where we’re at — not in the city and out in the country — I think that’s gonna help with our comeback.”

Lamp has heard people say personal customer service has become vital, but she says Holmes County businesses have always offered it.

“Keep doing what you’ve always done, and what you’re good at,” she says. “With my merchants, that is that one-on-one, making (customers) feel great from the time they walk in the door.”

To recover, Lamp says she will return to how she built Historic Millersburg when she started as director eight years ago — focus on gaining local support for small businesses first, then tourism. She suggests that business owners remain positive.

“I once made a statement to someone that I’m from Holmes County,” she says. “We can make anything.”