Downtown grocery unlikely
Photo: Dustin Godfrey
Despite the suite of economic incentives, the popular will of the people and the countless cold calls by municipal staff, it doesn’t look like Penticton will be getting a downtown grocery store in the near future.
City staff have been doing essentially all they can to bring a major grocery chain into the city’s downtown core ever the issue came up during a community engagement session in 2012.
The city’s economic development officer, Colleen Pennington, says she knows there’s a significant chunk of people who would love to see a downtown grocery store open, but at this point there’s not much more the city can do to attract one.
Already, Penticton is offering a ten-year property tax exemption for anyone willing to set up a grocery store in the downtown core. That’s the most it’s legally allowed to give under its governance structure.
On top of that, city staff have reached out to every single grocery chain operating in B.C., and no one has bit.
“Obviously there’s just not a business case for it,” says city councillor Helena Konanz.
Konanz points out the can only offer so much in the way of incentives, and at the end of the day “any investment is going to come down to a whether a developer feels he can make money.”
“I personally think a grocery store would be fantastic. I live in the downtown core so I think it would be wonderful,” she says.
The problem, however, is that Penticton already has lots of grocery stores. It’s just that none are downtown.
Even with tax incentives, setting up a grocery store is a major investment, especially since a downtown grocer would still have to compete with the other major chains only a short drive away, not to mention the smaller-scale options already popping up downtown.
Because of that, Pennington says there’s “not a lot of hope” that a grocery store will set up shop downtown – at least in the near future.
But that doesn’t mean it won’t happen at all.
Pennington says that as Penticton continues to grow the opportunity for a grocery store to flourish downtown will grow with it. Once there’s enough people, she is sure a grocery store will follow.
“It really becomes a question of dollars and sense, she says. “Once [the city] grows enough we will get some interest in the downtown core.”
Until that time, the city’s tax incentives will remain in place. The current incentive expires at the end of 2018, but the city is in the process of re-examining its incentives, and Pennington says there is plenty of opportunity to extend or revamp the current offer.
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