Bowling Green, Ohio, is a small city that would be even smaller if it weren't for Bowling Green State University.
The university enrolls over 17,000 students, according to the university's Office of Institutional Research. Those students breathe life into the Bowling Green community, each bringing a unique set of needs and interests.
The businesses of Bowling Green are there to provide for the university's students who call Bowling Green home for their college career. The students transform the atmosphere of the city, by going to restaurants, buying groceries, buying entertainment, renting apartments and more.
It's easy to see that the university is a vibrant and notable part of Bowling Green. But what happens in the summer months, when many students leave the city? Are Bowling Green businesses so student-oriented that they can't survive without them? How do these businesses make it in the summer months? How does the city's overall atmosphere change?
Our project, BG Without BGSU, looks at the ways students of the university affect local businesses, and the city of Bowling Green as a whole. We talked to business owners, workers and town residents to see how their lives are different without the influx of students.
Thursday, April 28, 2011
Longtime residents speak on university's influence
By Paul Barney
The presence of a university in a town brings in thousands of students that are not just members of the school community, but also to the city’s community as a whole. But what is a college town like when students are away on holidays or summer vacation? What impact does a university have on a city? Or what would a college town look like if that college didn’t exist at all?
Ben Quaintance and Nic Baldwin have answers for that. The two are students at Bowling Green State University and have lived in Bowling Green their entire lives. They know firsthand how important BGSU is to the city of Bowling Green as they have seen the campus and surrounding area heavily populated during the school year, but see that same population cut in half during school breaks. I sat down with each of them to get the scoop.
PB: What effect does BGSU have on the city of Bowling Green?
BQ: A good portion of the town is employed by BG. Without the university it would be a farm town. The school has brought a nice diversity of people.
NB: The biggest effects are the size and the employment. The job market would look completely different if the university weren’t here at all.
PB: What was it like growing up in a college town?
BQ: There’s two different parts. I only became exposed to BGSU when I came to school here.
NB: The way I always look at it, and I did even when I was younger and I do now, the university really is almost its own entity. It’s like two towns within the same city, and then therefore the two towns interact with each other in different ways. Students end up having to interact with the economic scene; they support the bars and the pizza joints. Meanwhile, the university supports the rest of the town because it’s the one employing most of the town. But even with that, growing up you didn’t exactly come to campus to hangout or anything. The campus is not like some city universities where it’s spread throughout town, it really is in one, central location. It really has just been kind of separate.
PB: What’s Bowling Green like during the holidays and summer vacation when all the students aren’t here?
BQ: During summer it’s a lot quieter. It’s definitely noticeable that there are less people.
NB: Dead. The population of the city cuts in half pretty much every summer. It’s really strange because I’ll go out and places just aren’t as busy. Even going to Meijer or driving around campus and no one is here. There’s no one to go out with so I kind of just stay at home. I always feel lonelier in the summer, which is funny because I’m from here, but I feel lonelier because everyone I know is gone.
PB: If BGSU didn’t exist, what impact do you think that would have on the city of Bowling Green?
BQ: The city wouldn’t have as much money coming in. It wouldn’t be as presentable.
NB: The town would be smaller as a whole. I think there would be less people here because there would be less work. The majority of the food establishments are here to support students. I think we would be much more [of a] manufacturing [town].
The presence of a university in a town brings in thousands of students that are not just members of the school community, but also to the city’s community as a whole. But what is a college town like when students are away on holidays or summer vacation? What impact does a university have on a city? Or what would a college town look like if that college didn’t exist at all?
Ben Quaintance and Nic Baldwin have answers for that. The two are students at Bowling Green State University and have lived in Bowling Green their entire lives. They know firsthand how important BGSU is to the city of Bowling Green as they have seen the campus and surrounding area heavily populated during the school year, but see that same population cut in half during school breaks. I sat down with each of them to get the scoop.
PB: What effect does BGSU have on the city of Bowling Green?
BQ: A good portion of the town is employed by BG. Without the university it would be a farm town. The school has brought a nice diversity of people.
NB: The biggest effects are the size and the employment. The job market would look completely different if the university weren’t here at all.
PB: What was it like growing up in a college town?
BQ: There’s two different parts. I only became exposed to BGSU when I came to school here.
NB: The way I always look at it, and I did even when I was younger and I do now, the university really is almost its own entity. It’s like two towns within the same city, and then therefore the two towns interact with each other in different ways. Students end up having to interact with the economic scene; they support the bars and the pizza joints. Meanwhile, the university supports the rest of the town because it’s the one employing most of the town. But even with that, growing up you didn’t exactly come to campus to hangout or anything. The campus is not like some city universities where it’s spread throughout town, it really is in one, central location. It really has just been kind of separate.
PB: What’s Bowling Green like during the holidays and summer vacation when all the students aren’t here?
BQ: During summer it’s a lot quieter. It’s definitely noticeable that there are less people.
NB: Dead. The population of the city cuts in half pretty much every summer. It’s really strange because I’ll go out and places just aren’t as busy. Even going to Meijer or driving around campus and no one is here. There’s no one to go out with so I kind of just stay at home. I always feel lonelier in the summer, which is funny because I’m from here, but I feel lonelier because everyone I know is gone.
PB: If BGSU didn’t exist, what impact do you think that would have on the city of Bowling Green?
BQ: The city wouldn’t have as much money coming in. It wouldn’t be as presentable.
NB: The town would be smaller as a whole. I think there would be less people here because there would be less work. The majority of the food establishments are here to support students. I think we would be much more [of a] manufacturing [town].
Grumpy Dave’s Pub relies on community to survive summer months
By Brendan Packert
It’s 7:30 p.m. on a Monday night. Before his bar opens for the evening, Grumpy Dave’s Pub manager Dave Harper sits alone at the end of his bar with stacks of papers in front of him. He’s filling out brackets for the evening’s entertainment, a weekly euchre tournament.
Groups of people begin shuffling up the flight of stairs from Main Street to the bar, located just above Easy Street Café.
It’s still rather quiet as couples, friends, and co-workers take their seats in pairs at the square wooden tables. One of the bartenders turns on the sound system to play ‘90s alternative music. There’s close to 40 people in the pub by 8:30 p.m.
The crowd is getting a little chattier as the minutes tick by. Chairs are shuffling across the old hard wood floor as euchre groups are being put together. Then in a thundering voice, Harper starts calling out names.
“Greg and Linda, table 3.” “Brett and Sarah, table 4.” “Robin and Jessie, table 12.”
Harper doesn’t need a microphone to project his commanding voice. The pub goes silent when he’s calling out names. You can’t even hear the music playing in the background.
After setting up the last few groups, he wishes everyone good luck and the euchre tournament begins.
“There are probably only five or six students here tonight,” Harper said, sitting back down at the bar. “Usually it’s only the townies that come out on Mondays.”
In a town like Bowling Green, there are countless numbers of bars and clubs people can choose to patronize. Harper knows he could never draw in a crowd the size that the Attic would get, or even the Cla-Zel. Grumpy Dave’s Pub is a 21 and older bar, with the exception of Tuesday’s comedy night and Friday’s local band showcase.
“We rely on the locals here, without them we wouldn’t have a business,” Harper said.
On any given night, the crowd could be 50 percent college aged patrons and 50 percent local patrons, he said. But without that local base, his business wouldn’t survive year round.
“If I had to only rely on the college crowd, I wouldn’t be able to survive through the summer months,” Harper said.
Harper knows that the window is closing for good business. Once summer hits, and the students go back home for the summer, business drags to a near halt.
“The weekend before finals is usually the last strong business weekend until August comes around,” Harper said.
Tim South, a bartender and bouncer at Grumpy Dave’s Pub, has spent the past three years living though and working through the summer.
“My first summer after graduating and working here was something else,” South said.
“It’s really weird to go from almost 100 people a night on weekends to less than 20. This place is just a ghost town in the summer,” South added.
“We get a lot of graduate students in the summer that stay in BG, but business isn’t the same,” Harper said.
Harper wouldn’t give exact numbers, but said his bar easily takes 25 percent cut in business.
“The two weeks right after BG lets out is the worst, that’s the worst part of the summer,” Harper said.
Once summer classes start is when business begins to pick up a little bit, Harper said. But the summer time crowd only softens the loss his bar takes.
“We try not to change the bar too much during the summer months, usually I only staff one bartender on the weekends, instead of two,” Harper said.
Kristie Capetillo has been working as a bartender at Grumpy Dave’s Pub for just over a year. She’s already experienced the lulls of one summer, and she’s not looking forward to another.
“The slight cut in hours doesn’t bother me, but just some nights nobody is here,” Capetillo said. “I don’t solely rely on my tips, but it’s a big part of my income.”
The overall state of the economy is hurting business too, Harper said.
“The price of domestic beer has gone up almost 10 cents per case, and that adds up especially when you carry almost 50 domestic beers,” Harper said.
The pub hasn’t had the strongest last couple of years in business, but Harper said he’s able to get by.
“All the businesses in town know the down period is coming, but at least we are able to stay open, some shops and businesses have to close up for the whole summer,” Harper said.
It’s 7:30 p.m. on a Monday night. Before his bar opens for the evening, Grumpy Dave’s Pub manager Dave Harper sits alone at the end of his bar with stacks of papers in front of him. He’s filling out brackets for the evening’s entertainment, a weekly euchre tournament.
Groups of people begin shuffling up the flight of stairs from Main Street to the bar, located just above Easy Street Café.
It’s still rather quiet as couples, friends, and co-workers take their seats in pairs at the square wooden tables. One of the bartenders turns on the sound system to play ‘90s alternative music. There’s close to 40 people in the pub by 8:30 p.m.
The crowd is getting a little chattier as the minutes tick by. Chairs are shuffling across the old hard wood floor as euchre groups are being put together. Then in a thundering voice, Harper starts calling out names.
“Greg and Linda, table 3.” “Brett and Sarah, table 4.” “Robin and Jessie, table 12.”
Harper doesn’t need a microphone to project his commanding voice. The pub goes silent when he’s calling out names. You can’t even hear the music playing in the background.
After setting up the last few groups, he wishes everyone good luck and the euchre tournament begins.
“There are probably only five or six students here tonight,” Harper said, sitting back down at the bar. “Usually it’s only the townies that come out on Mondays.”
In a town like Bowling Green, there are countless numbers of bars and clubs people can choose to patronize. Harper knows he could never draw in a crowd the size that the Attic would get, or even the Cla-Zel. Grumpy Dave’s Pub is a 21 and older bar, with the exception of Tuesday’s comedy night and Friday’s local band showcase.
“We rely on the locals here, without them we wouldn’t have a business,” Harper said.
On any given night, the crowd could be 50 percent college aged patrons and 50 percent local patrons, he said. But without that local base, his business wouldn’t survive year round.
“If I had to only rely on the college crowd, I wouldn’t be able to survive through the summer months,” Harper said.
Harper knows that the window is closing for good business. Once summer hits, and the students go back home for the summer, business drags to a near halt.
“The weekend before finals is usually the last strong business weekend until August comes around,” Harper said.
Tim South, a bartender and bouncer at Grumpy Dave’s Pub, has spent the past three years living though and working through the summer.
“My first summer after graduating and working here was something else,” South said.
“It’s really weird to go from almost 100 people a night on weekends to less than 20. This place is just a ghost town in the summer,” South added.
“We get a lot of graduate students in the summer that stay in BG, but business isn’t the same,” Harper said.
Harper wouldn’t give exact numbers, but said his bar easily takes 25 percent cut in business.
“The two weeks right after BG lets out is the worst, that’s the worst part of the summer,” Harper said.
Once summer classes start is when business begins to pick up a little bit, Harper said. But the summer time crowd only softens the loss his bar takes.
“We try not to change the bar too much during the summer months, usually I only staff one bartender on the weekends, instead of two,” Harper said.
Kristie Capetillo has been working as a bartender at Grumpy Dave’s Pub for just over a year. She’s already experienced the lulls of one summer, and she’s not looking forward to another.
“The slight cut in hours doesn’t bother me, but just some nights nobody is here,” Capetillo said. “I don’t solely rely on my tips, but it’s a big part of my income.”
The overall state of the economy is hurting business too, Harper said.
“The price of domestic beer has gone up almost 10 cents per case, and that adds up especially when you carry almost 50 domestic beers,” Harper said.
The pub hasn’t had the strongest last couple of years in business, but Harper said he’s able to get by.
“All the businesses in town know the down period is coming, but at least we are able to stay open, some shops and businesses have to close up for the whole summer,” Harper said.
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Local businesses explain BGSU's impact
What would Bowling Green be without Bowling Green State University? Would there be any economic ramifications would be the businesses face if the university weren’t here?
To answer to these questions we went to a number of businesses to determine the impact the university has on their establishments.
Five of these businesses were focused on and interviewed: Finders, Beckett’s, Ben Franklin, Pita Pit, and Student Book Exchange (SBX).
These five establishments incorporate different types of business and mindsets on how the university affects them.
Finders Records is a music store at 128 N. Main St.
Beckett’s a restaurant/bar located 146 N. Main St.
Ben Franklin Crafts, a craft store, is at 154 S. Main St.
Pita Pit is strictly a restaurant, is located at 522 E. Wooster St.
SBX sells books and BG merchandise is located two stores down from Pita Pit at 530 E. Wooster St.
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