Lessons from an Idea Friendly Gift Shop in a Small Town

By Deb Brown | November 26, 2023

One of the chapters in my upcoming workbook  is about using crafters as your next set of entrepreneurs. Stephanie from Canada shared her crafter entrepreneurial story with us!  You don’t have to go it alone.  Fourteen years ago Stephanie and her sister moved to a small town that had lots of summer tourists but no…

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Trail Art

By Deb Brown | June 19, 2020

What’s happening in Carlisle, Iowa? Lorin Ditzler from Warren County Hometown sent us this message.  This is in Carlisle IA, where there is a well-used regional trail that ends about 1/3 of a mile from the downtown. We wanted to encourage trail users to continue past the end of the trail and visit our downtown!…

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Art in the Rural

By Deb Brown | June 25, 2019

Art projects, events and pieces are often the last thing towns think of when it comes to economic development.There is a bit of a tendency for people to think of art as something other people do. If they think of art in their community at all, they think of murals or art exhibits.  Art is…

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