The hypocrisy doesn’t go unnoticed
The hypocrisy doesn’t go unnoticed...from a small business owner that is locally grown right here in Wenatchee.
TLDR: (To long didn’t read) The hypocrisy of standards that we hold towards large companies and small businesses. We received so much push back for being named Seattle Yoga Lounge, because we were perceived as outsiders coming in to disrupt the city, yet our community will welcome big box chain stores with open arms.
Let me start by welcoming WinCo to the valley. It is a joy to have you here and you have a customer in me. I hear nothing but great things.
When I moved back home to Wenatchee in January of 2019 I had a vision, it was and still is simple. To help create a more welcoming atmosphere for all to enjoy, and to bring in a fresh approach to something so familiar; Coffee and yoga. a community watering hole is what I called it.
I was living in Seattle in 2014 when I started laying the ground-work for what would soon become Seattle Yoga Lounge, a hole in the wall yoga studio right in the heart of the beautiful Greenlake community in Seattle. The dream would come with it’s up and downs like everything does, but we would finally get to open up on November 1st of 2015. I remember signing day because even then I was invested in my home-town. It was Saturday October 31st and the Golden Apple Marching Band had a competition in Sumner, WA, I was coaching the band that fall for the 3rd season. I left after the morning round and drove up to Seattle to meet with my attorney and the sellers to sign the finalized agreement. I was about to invest all of my life savings, as well as some of my friends and families who believed in my vision as well. Even in its inception, SYL was and always is a community, A collective of people, not an individual. Once it was all finalized, I rushed back down to Wenatchee again that same day, to meet up with Mr. Kovach and the rest of the GA Band to finish up our business. I believe we took first place at that competition. But what I remember the most, is Jim looking at me and asking me “so, how does it feel to be a business owner?” I simply looked at him and told him that I was excited! What Jim didn’t know at the time was that he, like many others in Wenatchee, had shaped me into the young adult that I was. In that moment, I realized that I felt as if I owed a lot of my values to him, and we stayed connected as I would continue to help out the band everytime they asked, for several years. I remember a cold fall practice Jim and I were walking around the track and he asked me how the business was going, and that’s when, after many long talks with Teddy, I finally told the first person that we were planning on moving back home to Wenatchee to open up our second location. Which was different from Portland, our original business plan.
I wanted to bring back and give back to a community that had shaped me to be the adult I am now. So, we jumped into the housing market and met the most amazing, kind human who sold us our house AND got us the commercial space that we are in now. I mean Shannon is amazing! She got us a tour of the space before the “space available” sign went up. We closed on our beautiful home on January 14th 2019 and moved in that night. We got right to work on maintaining our Seattle location and the planning and the introduction of a Café to our business model, which was a huge learning curve, but I would say I enjoyed the whole creative process, an area that I thrive in.
Teddy and I spent day and night building the space out ourselves, with help of course from friends and family. We chose to open up the café part of the business first since it was right in the middle of summer and yoga is typically much slower that time of the year. Plus it gave us some extra income to build out our yoga space. Because we didn’t get any financial help from banks we did it all ourselves and our Seattle location was doing great. I will never forget our soft opening, it took 45 minutes to get our first customer in, and he was visiting Wenatchee from Canada during a swim meet that the city holds every year. He came back the next day, which made him our first customer AND our first returning customer. Success!
We were welcomed to Wenatchee with open arms by Linda with The Downtown Association along with Sasha, Shilo, and Chelsea at the Wenatchee Chamber of Commerce, and our very own Mayor, Frank Kuntz, as well as the youth of the city! But the negative reviews came quick. From “I will never shop here,” to “why would you bring Seattle over to Wenatchee,” to "oh I see they hired a local to run the store". Um sir, I am Wenatchee native and I run my own store, thank you very much. All of this backlash because we kept our original business name of Seattle Yoga Lounge. We instantly got labeled as outsiders, and because of that many people never gave us a second look. Although I believe that we have done our very best to get the message out that we are local.
Which brings me to the opening of WinCo being highly publicized and being welcomed by everyone, including myself. I’m all about the growth of the city and I will welcome any business into the valley that is going to make Wenatchee a more successful thriving economy. BUT here is my question for those that give push back on some businesses; why not welcome all new businesses with open arms and fan fare. I guarantee that Winco doesn’t need help advertising they are opening a business in our community. The Wenatchee world needs to be focusing on promoting ALL businesses, especially small businesses in this time of the pandemic.
Wenatchee is a great place to live, and that’s why I moved back. It will continue to grow, and I promise it will grow at a much faster rate then some are willing to expect. Embrace the change and welcome all with open arms.
Elvis Garcia