About a year after opening in the Kodiak Marketplace, Grand Slam Toys and Games’ walls are lined with candy, puzzles, and stuffed toys ahead of the holiday season. It was the first to open there, and now they’re celebrating that anniversary.
They’re hosting a Business After Hours, a monthly event with the Kodiak Chamber of Commerce to highlight its members.
“We usually do the December Business After Hours, just to celebrate with everyone,” Beth Koehler, one of the store’s owners said.
Free food and raffles are just one way they try to thank their customers.
“We know that you can generally shop cheaper online – and we understand that and we appreciate the people that are willing to shop local, spend a little bit more to keep local businesses in business,” she said.
But this year is special for the Koehlers, it was their first time having the store downtown after being in midtown for six years leading up to opening in the Marketplace.
“Being downtown and experiencing our first tourist season – we had a lot of tourists, we had sold a lot of souvenirs,” Koehler said. “It gave me a lot of ideas for next year to bring in even more things that we’re really excited about.”
The Marketplace was a huge investment in commercial real-estate from the Kodiak Area Native Association. Grand Slam is joined by a bookstore, a bakery, the Alutiiq Museum’s gift shop, and several other locally owned businesses.
The investment has become a bit more than that though – the Marketplace has quickly become an anchor for the community’s downtown. It’s hosted storytelling events, artists, conferences and small business markets.
One of the biggest events that draws people in is the reception for the annual Harbor Lights Boat Parade organized by the Kodiak Maritime Museum. Captains and crews decorate their boats with lights and sail by the town, drawing spectators to the beaches, docks, and harbors to watch the parade. The museum’s executive director, Toby Sullivan, said over 500 people stopped by for the reception last year.
He said the Marketplace is the perfect spot since it’s so close to the harbor.
“If the wind is too bad and the parade can’t function safely, we’re asking boat owners to decorate their boats and just keep them in the harbor,” Sullivan said. “And then folks can walk around on the floats, take a look at the lights, and then go up to the marketplace to warm up in the lobby there with hot cocoa.”
Regardless of weather this year, Sullivan and volunteers will be waiting with cocoa and cookies on the ground floor of the marketplace both an hour before and after the parade.
Zach Koehler said seeing that kind of connection is one of the best parts of being in the marketplace.
“Last year, and I hope it repeats this year, everybody went and saw the Harbor Lights down in the harbor and then they came here and just hung out and touched base with each other and hung out, communicated, and just fellowshipped with each other,” he said.
He hopes some of the people coming for the reception stop by the store, too. The Harbor Lights Boat Parade is Dec. 14 and starts at 6 p.m.
