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Albemarle City Council members received Monday night a briefing on activities and services provided by Retail Strategies LLC during the preceding year.
Retail Strategies partners with municipalities and counties to assist them in recruitment and retention of national and regional businesses to their respective areas. Albemarle has partnered with the firm for the past nine years.
Joshua Davis, portfolio director, presented the report.
“We put together a pretty comprehensive data and demographics package,” Davis said, “and as you know, those can change from year to year, so it’s important for us to refresh this annually with the communities we serve.”
Davis listed a number of recent business openings in Albemarle which Retail Strategies had helped in recruiting, including Chick-Fil-A, Starbucks, Biscuitville, Aspen Dental, Ollie’s, Planet Fitness, Jersey Mike’s, East Coast Wings and Farmers Furniture.
“Retail builds on retail,” he added. “Retailers want to be around other thriving retailers.”
The organization utilizes a number of tools to determine customer location and demographics, including mobile data tracking and gap analysis.
“Mobile data tracking allows us to see where a lot of retail customers are coming from,” said Davis, who, using the Albemarle Walmart as an example, displayed a map showing customer reach.
“It’s easy to say that the people who shop at this Walmart live five to 10 miles away,” he said, “but if you look at the map you can see that customers come from as far as 20 to 25 minutes away, including Anson and Montgomery County residents.”
Gap analysis identifies retail services not currently available in the city, forcing customers to buy elsewhere.
“It can also be termed a leakage report,” he said.
Although unable to mention specific business names, Davis said that Retail Strategies is currently in discussions with several firms regarding the benefits of relocating to Albemarle, including a full service restaurant, two regional grocers and a national beauty retailer.
Regarding the gap analysis/leakage report, Councilman Chris Bramlett said, “I’ve seen this before, and we have an incredible opportunity here. We’ve got far too many people shopping outside our area…it’s almost unbelievable to see.”
In other business, the city council:
• Received an update on activities and programs of the Nehemiah Project from Carla Poplin, community resource director and director of Growing Minds Mentoring Center.
• Unanimously approved ordinance 24-26, allowing drop-in short-term childcare in certain districts within the city.
• Unanimously approved the purchase of a tract of property on U.S. 52 previously occupied by Service Distributing.
• Adjourned until the next regular meeting, Sept. 3 (moved to Tuesday because of Labor Day holiday).

Toby Thorpe is a freelance writer for The Stanly News & Press.