Back in Business: Canonsburg reimagines, redevelops downtown
Katherine Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
Chelsea Becker, right, and her brother, Jacob Ammon ,are the faces of The Nook, a family-owned rustic-chic antique store in downtown Canonsburg. Becker said opening a business in Canonsburg was easier than she dreamed, and local business owners have been supportive.
Katherine Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
Scarmazzi Homes is investing in downtown Canonsburg, where ground broke on eight luxury apartments last year. The company also built a headquarters and design center in the town’s east end last year, and is excited to be part of Canonsburg’s revitalization.
Katherine Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
Chelsea Becker, right, opened The Nook along Pike Street in March. The antique boutique is a family affair, and the storefront is often staffed by Becker’s younger brother, Jacob Ammon, pictured with her.
Katherine Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
After nearly a decade of driving along Pike Street, Canonsburg resident Chris Beers went for it, opening his seventh Grandpa Joe’s location last year. Beers said folks drive from all over the 15317 zip code and beyond – including Steubenville, Ohio – to browse the store and take home nostalgic and quirky candies, making it, to his surprise, one of his top-performing locations.
Katherine Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
Andrew Andronas made his first real estate investment last year, in downtown Canonsburg. Andronas owns the former McCrory department store building and hopes to lease the 10,000-square-foot second floor (where he’s pictured here) this year.
Fresh flowers and neatly trimmed trees line Pike Street, and once-vacant windows welcome visitors inside downtown Canonsburg’s storefronts.
“There’s a buzz,” said Lisa Scarmazzi, Canonsburg native and director of economic development for the borough. “We have Downtown Nutrition, Linda’s Bakery, Canonsburg Cake Company. The Nook. SerendipiDEE blooms just came in. We have Western Edge Seafood coming. It’s just taking off.”
More than a dozen businesses have opened in Canonsburg within the last two years, and people stroll Pike Street, peeking in windows and ducking into storefronts, every day of the week. The bustling downtown is a noticeable change to residents and commuters who pass through every day.
“I remember as you walked downtown, there was nothing in storefronts. The windows were dirty, it was dirty on the streets,” said Canonsburg Borough Council President Eric Chandler, who grew up in the Small Town Musical Capitol of the World.
“Then when I would look at pictures before it was like they had, well, Isaly’s was here, the men’s shop was here. Different, smaller businesses were here,” Chandler said. “Then all of a sudden it was like they just closed up and that was it. I remember growing up, people are like, ‘I’m going to move from here because this is not a place I want to raise my family.'”
For decades, once-grand buildings along Canonsburg’s main street stood empty, relics of a prosperous past, reminders the town had, like so many small towns, faded along with the industries that built it.
Now, Canonsburg is the place to be.
Last year, Andrew Andronas, a 2005 Canon-McMillan graduate who works in natural gas, made his first real estate investment along Pike Street.
While volunteering downtown with his wife, Dolly, also from Canonsburg, Andronas noticed something in the air.
“When you’re down in town and you’re volunteering your time and you’re cleaning up and you’re meeting people and you’re in the heart of it, you can’t help but just kind of look at it all, analyze it,” said Andronas, who serves as co-chair on the Canonsburg Old Fashioned Christmas Committee. “I think to myself, ‘If this town is thriving, which it once was … if it comes back, when’s the time to financially get in?'”
Andronas spent two years researching Canonsburg’s business district, and learned that in 1939, McCrory’s Department Store – a big-box store from the Big Apple akin to Macy’s or the former Kaufmann’s – determined Pike Street was an ideal location for a new storefront.
“You have a large corporation … that has nothing to do with Canonsburg, they do a study on Canonsburg and they identify that frontage right down the middle of town as what they thought was the real estate that they wanted. That was kind of my push,” Andronas said. “If it’s good enough for McCrory’s then, if history repeats itself and it becomes bustling once again, that same frontage, good enough for a department store, probably good enough for my family.”
Andronas reached out to the building owners, who in true small-town fashion he’d known his whole life, and worked out a deal. Shortly after Andronas acquired the massive former McCrory’s with its 10,000 square feet of potential upstairs and the longstanding City Mission flagship store downstairs, he made a second purchase.
Fresh Start Café opens at 117 Pike St. (Andronas’ building) this fall.
“I’m not a real estate guy; I’m a Canonsburg guy,” Andronas said. “I’m not buying these buildings to become wealthy. This is where we’re invested, you know, emotionally, financially. So that’s kind of the emotional aspect of it.
“But I always really had a passion for redevelopment real estate, something that’s old that needs a little TLC, has all the potential in the world to become new again, exciting. And that’s Canonsburg, right?”
Taking a gamble
Chris Beers noticed Canonsburg’s potential on a drive through town, a drive he’d taken almost daily since moving to what locals affectionately call “Guntown,” with his family in 2011. For years, Beers passed by vacant window after vacant window.
But then, Rusty Gold opened. And Iceberg’s ice creamery.
“Then the growth with Chicco Baccello, ARC. (I thought) ‘Holy smokes, they’re going to put that much money into that building in downtown Canonsburg.’ It was like, something is happening here,” said Beers, founder and owner of seven Grandpa Joe’s Candy Stores. “And then Alleyway Saturdays. It was like, wow, there’s some energy. This is kind of exciting.”
When Mark and Ellen Bachmann, who own the former PNC Bank building, affixed accent lights to its exterior, a lightbulb went off in Beers’ head.
“It’s a beautiful building,” Beers said. “I think it was a combination of those lights, plus the Alleyway Saturday events that said, ‘You know what? It’s time to do this.'”
So he did it. Last year, Beers took a gamble and opened Grandpa Joe’s along Pike Street. To his surprise, the location is one his top performers. And to Canonsburg’s credit, the town is a great place for business.
“The event organizers and the committee chairs have a true passion for wanting to make Canonsburg succeed. These people are residents of Canonsburg that have lived here and are passionate about seeing the revitalization of their community,” he said. “So that’s a big difference in Canonsburg compared to a lot of locations that I’m in.”
Beers said Lisa Scarmazzi is a driving force behind Canonsburg’s revitalization.
“She’s worth every single penny, and she gives it all back,” Beers said. “She goes far above what her job requirements are.”
Scarmazzi was hired as director of economic development in July 2020, after Chandler and the borough council hosted a community workshop to learn what Canonsburg residents wanted to see downtown.
“We wanted to redevelop Canonsburg, but we didn’t know how, per se,” said Chandler.
During the workshop, parking and building vacancy emerged as the two biggest areas in need of improvement. In order to fill vacancies, borough council learned, Canonsburg needed a face.
“A friend of mine (said) you really need someone who is the point person,” Chandler said. “We started throwing names around. We knew Lisa was volunteering in other areas and people talked highly of her. We reached out to her. And she said yes. She has a budget, but she volunteers her time. She doesn’t get paid. She was like, how can I give back?”
Scarmazzi gives back, in part, by bringing in business.
“Most of the new businesses are folks that are young and this is their first business. What I love about it, it’s not just having their store. They want to become very involved in the community. They have fresh new ideas. I just love their energy. And they’re bringing that energy into town,” she said.
Fresh faces come to town
Chelsea Becker, a 2011 Canon-McMillan grad, is one of those fresh young faces.
After college, Becker remained in Ohio, where she and her husband, Seth, ran a popular antique stand. Becker’s mother suggested the couple open a brick-and-mortar store.
“We were debating on going from Ohio to Pennsylvania, and we looked at some places in Ohio,” said Becker. “Lisa Scarmazzi was the one that kind of pointed us in the right direction of Canonsburg, like down here. We grew up here, and Chicco Baccello was just opening, the winery was open and all these places were just popping up. It was kind of that moment of, ‘Hey, you know, let’s just go for it.'”
Becker and her family – her mother, Dianna Ammon, is “head honcho” and Becker’s sister, Julianne Murgie, and brother Jacob Ammon help out at The Nook – fell into prime real estate next door to Iceberg’s.
“It wasn’t as hard as it seems,” Becker said.
Like many Pike Street small business owners, Becker quickly began making connections and got involved in the community. She joined the Garden Club, a group of residents devoted to beautifying town, and is looking into joining the Oktoberfest planning committee with her mom.
“I grew up here, but I didn’t know how much there was to do around Canonsburg,” said Becker. “I think it’s so important that people see families and business owners showing that they don’t just care about their business, but they care about the community.”
Becker uses the classroom space at the back of The Nook to bring the wider community together at events like her recent Tie-Dye workshop, for which she teamed up with Iceberg’s. She plans to host biweekly or weekly events, including crafting for kids and teens and team-building workshops in her space, and is excited to collaborate with other small business owners.
“Everyone’s been extremely welcoming,” Becker said of the other business owners. “We find the connection and loyalty between other small businesses down here to be so heartwarming.”
Last March, Scarmazzi Homes moved its headquarters from Houston to the east end of Canonsburg, where the company erected a modern design center and beautified the town’s entrance.
“I grew up in Canonsburg, and we built our first home where my first-grade school was, on Hawthorne Street,” said Paul Scarmazzi, co-founder of Scarmazzi Homes and a member of the Greater Canonsburg Economic Development Committee. “It’s really what matters most to me, more so than our business, actually – the opportunity to be part of something that’s bigger than you, and the opportunity to impact the larger environment for the benefit of everybody.”
Paul Scarmazzi said moving to Canonsburg has been rewarding, and the relationships between building owners and business owners is special.
“We’re all kind of in it together,” he said. “The wind seems to be at the town’s back. We want to be a destination, we want to be a regional draw, we want to be an asset where people can come live, work and play.”
Scarmazzi Homes has the “live” part down: Last year, the company again invested financially in Canonsburg. In November 2020, Scarmazzi Homes broke ground on a new townhouse complex behind the strip mall, and all eight units are expected to be leased by the end of this summer.
“It’s part of the town’s growth, reinvention, reinvigoration. We’re a small part of it and we’re really happy to be,” said Paul Scarmazzi. “We believe in the town, and we think it offers something: That intimate, homey feel where you’re living in an urban setting.”
It’s the big city in a small town that makes Canonsburg so unique, and the camaraderie between everyone – business owners, local government and the community – that makes it a great place to open up shop.
“I may be biased, but I wouldn’t want to invest anywhere else,” said Andronas. “Something about Canonsburg, you know. People are motivated to see transformation. Whenever it comes to investing in Canonsburg, you don’t just invest in Canonsburg. You invest with Canonsburg.”
Becker agrees that it was everyone from the economic development committee to the code enforcement officials to local government to other small business owners who made it possible for her to open The Nook.
“It was such a big dream that we had, but we were such a little people in this community, and we were able to do it,” Becker said. “There is opportunity, and you can open your own business. It’s happening here right now.”
Chandler, Scarmazzi and Andronas share a dream of having every building occupied soon, and Becker and Beers encourage anyone with a passion to open up in Canonsburg. There’s plenty of opportunity, but the number of spots downtown is quickly dwindling.
“You have an idea. You drive past the vacant spot, same thing I did for 10 years. What are you waiting for?” Beers said. “Just rip the Band-Aid off and let’s do it. Open a store.”