SHOP THE SLO LIFE WITH THE SAN LUIS OBISPO COLLECTION: INFUSING NATIONAL SHOPS WITH SLO SPIRIT 路 OP-ED BY DOMINIC TARTAGLIA OF DOWNTOWN SLO 路 OUT OF POCKET
IN THIS ISSUE
VOLUME 2, ISSUE 2 路 SUMMER, 2014
SLO SUMMER The San Luis Obispo Collection brings together world class shopping, the city’s finest restaurants, upscale retail, museums and theater, and sits adjacent to Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa. San Luis Obispo, named the Happiest City in America, is the cultural hub of the Central Coast, which embodies the California lifestyle and offers locals and visitors alike historic architecture, sweeping vineyards, pristine beaches, charming beach towns and mountain ranges, and is home to Cal Poly University. Please enjoy the SLO Merchant, our new community newsletter.
INFUSING NATIONAL STYLE WITH NATIVE SPIRIT
Sommer, Sara, and Nora—managers of Sephora, Pottery Barn, and Barnes & Noble—meet to discuss how they bring the SLO spirit to their national shops.
ake a walk through downtown San Luis
T
She was a store manager and footwear buyer
central coast vibe with its sunshine, ocean
breezes, and strolling shoppers. Therese Cron,
business sold, she transplanted her local spirit straight into the heart of SLO’s new Pottery Barn
Obispo, and you can’t help but feel the
property manager of the San Luis Obispo
Collection, wondered how SLO’s downtown district manages to feel so local while still
delivering such a diversity of regional and national shopping? She invited Sommer Pezzi, Sara Boller, and Nora Johnson—managers for national powerhouses Sephora, Pottery Barn, and Barnes & Noble—for a lunch meeting at
Palazzo Giuseppe to talk about how they infuse
for local favorite Copeland Sports. When that location. Nora—the centeral coast’s most recent transplant—lives in Atascadero. She believes
that bookstores are the heart of a community,
and one of her favorite things is working with central coast schools, hosting book fairs and
field trips, keeping school reading lists in stock,
and giving away free books through Barnes & Noble’s Summer Reading Program.
their national shops with SLO spirit.
All three managers agree that making a personal
Sommer, Sara, and Nora found their ways to the
local spice into the national brew. Sommer loves
central coast from regions as far flung as Guam to as nearby as Morongo Valley, but they all share
a passion for California’s local culture. Sommer
has lived in Shell Beach for more than fourteen years. She calls her staff at Sephora “amazing” and encourages them to challenge themselves
daily to provide Sephora’s clients with a sense of home. Sara—a true local—has been in San
Luis Obispo since she started Cal Poly in 1989.
connection with local clients is the key to mixing
thinking out of the box when she’s assisting her local clientele, treating clients as if they are
friends—and indeed, she says, many clients do
become friends. As Therese concluded from their discussion, “San Luis Obispo has all the
amenities of a world-class shopping destination, but with much better weather and relaxed, happy managers who really love what they do.”
Pictured right: top to bottom: Sommer, Nora, Sara
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SAN LUIS OBISPO: WHERE MEMORIES ARE BORN
An op-ed piece by Dominic Tartaglia of the SLO Downtown Association on what makes experiences memborable in downtown San Luis Obispo.
A
t
the
San
Luis
Obispo
Downtown
Association we are in the business of
creating unique experiences for our residents and guests that are just as memorable as the
smell of fresh cut grass and a Santa Maria style BBQ. SLO’s downtown has a rich diversity of
businesses, friendships, and backgrounds as well as the stories that go along with
so much local character. These kinds of personal connections transform a Thursday night Farmers’ Market into an experience as
memorable as a first kiss or the last taste of a barbequed rib that you still dream about.
While the kiss and the rib are the focal point of the memory, the ambiance surrounding that moment is is what makes the experience
memorable. Providing this sense of place and community is something the SLO Downtown Association takes very seriously.
Today, walking through downtown San Luis Obispo you can still see the buildings that
this town was built around: Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa, the Anderson and Wineman
Hotels, and the Creamery for example. When San Luis Obispo developed, Downtown was the cultural center for many miles and those
buildings were the foundation for many
people’s businesses and fondest memories. My dad recalls, as a young boy, bouncing down a country road toward the Downtown
Creamery to deposit the family farm’s milk. The careful preservation of the buildings and local economy are the keystones of what
created the atmosphere that has drawn guests
from around the world to our neighborhood for many years.
While putting lights in trees creates an
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experience for visitors, it’s really just teeing
of the community is the result of generations
stories to be shared with future generations
turn, those exchanges create a hub for the
up the chance for the next set of memories and of the “Great Downtown San Luis Obispo.”
As a neighborhood we take pride in keeping the streets clean and inviting, much like
people take pride in keeping their front yards manicured and green. We do this because we
want people from surrounding neighborhoods
to feel welcome and safe when they visit, and we hope to see them often. This simple act of
sharing our shops and businesses with the rest
of cultural exchanges among neighbors. In
community where rich experiences happen
and fond memories are born. For 39 years the San Luis Obispo Downtown Association has
played host to countless parades, markets, concerts, events, and warm summer nights,
and we look forward to many more years to
come where our traditions can become your fondest memories. Vist downtownslo.com to learn more.
FASHION & HOME GOODS
Jamba Juice jambajuice.com
Abercrombie & Fitch abercrombie.com
Palazzo Giuseppe palazzogiuseppe.com
Banana Republic bananarepublic.com
Pizza Solo pizzasolo.com
Chico’s chicos.com
Sal’s Paradise slosals.com
Express express.com
SloCo Pasty Co. slocopastyco.com
GAP gap.com
Splash Cafe Seafood & Grill splashcafe.com
Ian Saude Gallery iansaude.com
Starbucks starbucks.com
Moondoggies Surf Shop moondoggies.com
SERVICES
Pottery Barn potterybarn.com
Solstice Sunglass Boutique solsticesunglasses.com Sunglass Hut sunglasshut.com
Sephora sephora.com
Salon Lux-Aveda salonlux.com
SPECIALTY
Urban Outfitters urbanoutfitters.com
The Apple Store apple.com
White House Black Market whitehouseblackmarket.com
Cal Poly Downtown calpoly.edu
Victoria’s Secret victoriassecret.com
FOOD
Bali’s Yogurt 805-594-1172
Bull’s Tavern facebook.com/bullstavernslo Chinos Rock & Tacos chinorocks.com
California Pizza Kitchen cpk.com
Barnes and Noble barnesandnoble.com The Movie Experience themovieexperience.com Open Air Flowers openairflowersslo.com Papyrus papyrusonline.com
Powell’s Sweet Shoppe powellsss.com
IN PLAIN SIGHT
Man-about-town George Krauth dishes on the fashions, flavors, designs, and décor he discovers as he travels the globe tracking trends as Creative Director for Jamestown.
W
hen I was a kid, I collected things related to
latest big development. The Creative & Marketing
pub, the color of the sky over San Francisco Bay
of swizzle sticks from a globe trotting aunt
building the brand identities themselves, each with
to vision boards that we’ve created for each of
travel: restaurant matchbooks, postcards,
even airline luggage tags. Fueled by an assortment collected at the dawn of the Jet Age, this penchant
for squirreling away cool stuff has served me well as Creative Director for Jamestown. I encourage
all my team members to make note of the things that inspire them, and we compete in a friendly
competition to bring in the next chip of tile or
swatch of fabric that will end up in Jamestown’s
team’s main task is to create brands for Jamestown developments. Not only are we charged with
a logo, website, and an array of printed collateral; we are also challenged to extend those brands
in all kinds of ways, including signage, fixtures
and furnishings, colors and trims, façades, and
the creation of brands-within-brands for events
and specialized activities. Everything inspires us: the felted coaster under our bourbon at the local
in September, the ribbon on a tote bag we found at the gift show in Paris. We pin our inspirations
our brands. This encourages us to brainstorm in plain sight. It’s pretty amazing, as a new brand
develops, to let your eyes drift from a tattered old signal flag you pinned to the board months before
to the bright blue brand it inspired at a property
like One West Victory. Visit Jamestownlp.com for more inspiration.
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