BRATTLEBORO — Thank you for this article about the closing of At the Oasis (my store) and Verde, but please accept a correction.
Your piece contained an accurate quote from me, but concluded from what I said that economic concerns were not the reason for my choosing to close my store.
Finances were certainly not the only reason for closing, but the difficult economy and the pull of online and nearby box-store shopping were major factors in my decision to shut down.
Rising expenses across the board and a trend of diminished spending in general, and local spending in particular, made surviving profitably an impossibility.
In the last several years, the economy of our town has been suffering far more than we like to admit, and I want to face that fact head-on. No heads in the sand. If we talk about it we can work on improving the situation.
This is a great town and I love it dearly but it is grappling with big issues. Poverty, unemployment, and the loss of a healthy middle class are problems we all need to admit are real, and we all need to address these issues as best we can.
We all love our eclectic small-scale downtown with its mom-and-pop boutique feel, but to preserve it we need to work on it and support it.
I look forward to seeing what the future holds for us as an involved, creative population.