By Daphne Jackson
The Hamilton Downtown Association’s new coordinator, Hannah Honey, said she thinks it is important for people to realize how shopping locally can affect the community.
“Keeping the local economy strong, making sure people are aware that when they purchase locally, and when they actually frequent our local businesses that it really does make a difference, and it helps our entire community, from our businesses, obviously, to our nonprofits, our schools, it kind of all ties into each other,” said Honey.
Honey, originally from Darby, moved back to the Bitterroot Valley after graduating from Duke University. The HDA’s new coordinator started in December, beginning the job right before the holiday events started. She said even though she did start at a busy time of year, the transition was much smoother than it could have been because the previous coordinator had already arranged the events for December.
“January has slowed down a bit, and I’m able to figure out how things are being done, really get to know the mission of our organization, and get to know the board members and what their goals are,” she said. “We don’t have any events in January or February, and then we start back up in March with our First Fridays. The first First Friday is ‘Main Street Madness,’ and we don’t really have the logistics of it planned, but we have some fun ideas floating around of how we’ll kick off the season with that.”
HDA President Susan Wetzsteon, who has been involved with the HDA in different capacities for five years, said board members are excited to work with Honey.
“She is a dynamic young woman,” Wetzsteon said. “She’s really enthusiastic, she’s got us organized as far as an online presence. Detail-wise, she’s just really pulling us together, and she’s going to make it so we can do our activities in an easier, streamlined way.”
“She’s a good asset,” added Wetzsteon. “We dearly miss Russ Lawrence, our previous coordinator, but Hannah is fully on board, and you’ll be seeing a lot of her out in the community.”
Wetzsteon said although the job of coordinator is only a part-time position, Honey has a wide variety of tasks within her new role, from coordinating cooperation with the City Council and the Chamber of Commerce to radio interviews about the HDA.
“She pretty much will be on every committee that we have, and make sure that advertising and publicity gets done properly,” she said. “She has a lot of hats to wear, and she’s doing a good job with it.”
Honey said a large part of her job is handling administrative responsibilities such as tracking member dues, organizing sponsorships for events, and organizing the necessary steps to plan events. She said one of her main focuses is increasing public knowledge of the HDA through marketing.
“Our kind-of big mission is to really instill that ‘shop, live, give local’ message throughout the entire community,” said Honey. “I definitely am focused on getting that message out there. We’re playing around a lot with our social media campaigns, and hopefully going to work on getting somewhat larger media attention about the cool things that are going on here.”
Wetzsteon said she thinks a healthy downtown business is an important component of a strong community where people want to live and raise children, the type of community she hopes the HDA can help bring about.
Honey said one of her goals as the HDA’s coordinator is to help ensure Hamilton businesses located outside of the primary downtown district can participate in the HDA as well.
“Even though we’re called the Downtown Association, (the board) is really trying to embrace this bridge-to-bridge community,” she said. “I know, since Hamilton has such a defined downtown district, it’s hard to think bigger or outside of that parameter when you think downtown, but I think part of what I’m going to do… is to really try to spread that message throughout this year, to make sure that businesses outside of just that downtown district feel included, and know that this association is also for them.”
The primary goal of the HDA, Wetzsteon said, is to strengthen the community by promoting downtown business as a viable option for the community’s shopping needs. She said the biggest challenge HDA faces is bringing awareness to the importance of supporting local business.
According to Wetzsteon, the number of opportunities people have to buy things locally, and to find jobs locally, is dependent on whether people choose to shop in town or if they go somewhere else.
“If you come into Mikesell’s (where Wetzsteon is employed) and spend $100 on something, that $100 means I get paid, and I can go to the grocery store, and I can buy my groceries,” she said. “Then that merchant is getting serviced, then those employees can go and buy something. If one of those breaks down, then nobody is prosperous, and nobody can live well.”
