Like many small towns, downtown Fairfield, Connecticut, is pockmarked with signs of the recent economic downturn. Fairfield Stationers, at one point one of the largest and oldest non-chain storefronts on the downtown drag, has closed shop and moved down the road. Elsewhere, a nail salon has gone out of business and a couple of locally own clothing stores are no more. In the place of a one hundred year old family run grocery store that had summer cookouts on the sidewalk beyond is a Chase Bank, all cool glass and steel.
But things have been grim before.
Paul Jordanopolous, owner of the Media Wave Movies & More video store in downtown Fairfield, remembers that when he opened his store, in 1997, things were "a ghost town." He opened right after the closing of The Fairfield Store, a large, family-run department store that was the downtown Fairfield economy's centerpiece.
Jordanopolous, himself a survivor in an era of mail order video rentals and automated movie dispensers, remembers the situation more than ten years ago like someone who had survived some apocalyptic blast.
"A lot of storefronts were closed and the dead Fairfield Store building was a big void," he says. "Half to ¾ of the restaurants that are here now didn't exist. The nightlife was dead. After seven I'd peek my head out the door and there wouldn't be a single car on the street."
Still, it could be worse. "Think if we were a company town, where the plant gets shut down and the town just dies," Joranopolous says.
Fairfield is a company town of sorts. According to the Business Council of Fairfield County, Fortune magazine ranked seven Fortune 500 Companies in Fairfield County in 2009. One of them, General Electric, is located in Fairfield, near the Merritt Parkway.
But much of Fairfield's economy comes from commuters who take the train into New York City or Stamford every morning, without a single industry keeping the town alive. And in the 12 years since Jordanopolous has opened, a number of high profile restaurants have opened up. In the space where the Fairfield Store used to be are a number of national chains, among them Banana Republic Women, Chico's, and Border's.
Since the economic crash of 2007, unemployment has steadily risen, although according to the Business Council of Fairfield County, Fairfield County's unemployment rate (7.3%) is still below Connecticut's average, and well below the U.S. Average (8.9%).
And there are still new stores opening all the time.
Giuliana's, a small boutique that does custom dresses and alternations, as well as selling jewelry and fashion accessories, opened up a few months ago. Giuliana's owner, Carmen de la Brena, when asked about the recession and it has negatively affected her business says, flatly, "No."
"My business is better this year," she says. "People won't buy new clothes but they have things in their closets that they need altered. Also, more people buy things from sales at department stores that may not necessarily fit. So for a few dollars more, they can come to me and I can make them fit."
And the future looks even brighter for de la Brena, "And this is now the season for weddings and proms!"
Things may be turning around elsewhere, too. Like a recent story in the New York Times about the city's economy being somewhat uplifted by restaurants, there are two new restaurants in downtown – one, a Japanese restaurant called Kibatsu, just opened and the other is being worked on.
Stamford's Colony Pizza, ranked amongst the best pizza places in Connecticut on PizzaTherapy.com, is moving into downtown Fairfield in the coming months, set to occupy the Fairfield Stationers spot, along a road that sees Mike's Pizza, Pizza Palace, and pizza being served in upscale eateries Centro's, Quattro Pazzi, and Café Madeline's. Longstanding establishment Mike's is going to knock down the wall that separated it from the abandoned nail salon and will open up to include additional seating and a full bar (in an effort to appeal to the untapped college market of nearby Fairfield University, Sacred Heart University, and U Conn Stamford).
Fairfield, Connecticut may be exhibiting some of the signs of the recent economic downswing (Jordanopolous says "Movies are easy for people to cut out of the budget"), there are enough signs of economic growth or, at the very least turnaround, that it's hard to get too disheartened. Every end has a new beginning or, at the very least, another slice of pizza.
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