Jennifer Broggie stands at the counter at “The Meeting Place on Market,” the subject of her new memoir about entrepreneurship in the Rust Belt.
Mackenzie Clement/Lima News
LIMA — Throughout her 20 years in business, Jennifer Broggie has learned to play to her strengths rather than imitate her competitors.
Brogie founded The Meeting Place on Market in 2002, ignoring naysayers and financiers who told her a coffee shop in downtown Lima would likely fail.
Her mission is to start businesses in places that need development.
“It wasn’t a high traffic area, so we didn’t realize that it would be a disadvantage to us,” Broggie said.
It’s been tough running an independent coffee shop in a downtown that’s struggled amid the Great Recession, the coronavirus pandemic and the rise of corporate chains like Starbucks and Biggby, but Brogy forged ahead nonetheless.
Brogie reflects on her work in her new memoir, “Can Social Entrepreneurship Work in the Rust Belt? A Mother, a Dream, and a Declining Downtown,” published by Lived Places Publishing as part of a collection of first-person stories from up-and-coming entrepreneurs.
“As an entrepreneur, it’s important to do something unique that leverages your strengths because that’s the key to success,” Broggie said.
“If you’re always trying to imitate someone else, you’re probably playing to your own weaknesses.”
For Broggie, that meant closing her coffee shop early so she wasn’t overworking herself trying to emulate her corporate competitors.
It also meant using his software experience to find new customers online: He set up an Etsy shop selling gift boxes, tumblers, and bento lunches using keywords like “gifts for mom” to people looking for last-minute presents or quick meals, and rented out the unused office space behind his coffee shop to fellow entrepreneurs and remote workers.
“There’s not much competition in that field,” she says.
Things are finally starting to improve in downtown Lima, too, helping to draw customers to The Meeting Place.
While pedestrian traffic has not yet returned to 2002 levels, Broggie said there are more people downtown now than there were five years ago, and he hasn’t heard people speak fondly of downtown Lima in years.
“That makes a big difference,” she says. “Because if you’re proud of your city, you’re talking positively about it. It promotes the city. It might make more people want to invest, more people want to stay and start businesses there.”
Signed copies of Brogee’s book are for sale at The Meeting Place. The book is also available at https://bit.ly/45Vg5gR
