Longtime successes spotlight resurgent retail scene

By MARK HIGGINS
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Retailing along Rainier Avenue reflects a mix of older, successful businesses -- Borracchini's Bakery & Mediterranean Market, and Mutual Fish Co. -- and newer Asian mini-malls serving the valley's Vietnamese, Cambodian and Laotian residents.

"We've been here 74 years," says Remo Borracchini, who runs the family's bakery. "We've seen the valley go from the heights to the depths, and now it's great again."

Borracchini was born eight blocks from the store in the house where his parents got their start baking goods in the basement. His parents came from Florence and were part of a wave of Italian migration into the valley after the turn of the century.

Now, Borracchini says proudly, his three daughters are involved in the bakery, which is undergoing a $200,000 expansion. "We're gung-ho on the area."

The Pepsi-Cola Bottling Co. and Darigold employ more than 500 workers at major production plants in the north end of the valley.

As part of its commitment to the neighborhood, Pepsi donates a percentage of its local sales to Rainier Valley community programs. The plant's general manager, Ken Alterman, says the program generates an average of $100,000 a year, and employees who live in the area help decide where the money should be spent.

Darigold also is involved in the community and recently said it will allow a local arts organization to paint a mural on the dairy's west wall, facing Rainier Avenue South.

One idea is to paint a circus scene incorporating portraits of Rainier Valley residents and business people in the audience, says Jerri Plumridge, the arts program manager for SouthEast Effective Development Inc. Although the Darigold site has been used for dairy production for more than 60 years, at one time a traveling circus used the land to set up its big tents.

"The word 'resurgence' is commonly used around here, and that is accurate," says Doug Marshall, Darigold's vice president of public affairs.

Most noticeable are big-box retailers recently enticed to locate in the valley's north end, roughly between Interstate 90 and Genesee Street.

The arrival of Drug Emporium, QFC, Starbucks and Hollywood Video are the result of hard work by city officials and SouthEast Effective Development, a non-profit, community development corporation.

They gathered a coalition of partners, including the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, to create a $15 million shopping center at 3820 Rainier Ave. S. The 1994 opening of Rainier Valley Square did much to renew a sense of pride in the neighborhood.

The Safeway and Drug Emporium stores at the square continue to be among the top moneymakers for those chains, and on Friday nights, Hollywood Video has a line of customers out its door.

It's "printing money," jokes Darla Morton, the plain-spoken, energetic manager of the Rainier Chamber of Commerce.

Ê

Rainier Valley also is one of the first sites sought by Eagle Hardware & Garden when the home-improvement chain began to expand in the early 1990s.

Eagle's Rainier Valley store was built on the site of Sicks' Stadium, the humble sports arena where generations of fans went for their pre-Mariner baseball fix. Sicks' Stadium came down in 1979 after a 41-year run.

When Eagle remodeled a warehouse on the site in 1991, it erected a historical display of Sicks' Stadium at the front door, including a home plate and pitcher's mound.

The valley's expanding retail base has helped solidify the neighborhood as a shopping destination. But what it now needs, suggests the chamber's Morton, are fewer nail and hair salons and more eclectic and practical stores. On her list are a bookstore, antique shop, Kinko's copy shop, as well as a general merchandiser such as Fred Meyer or Target.

It is estimated that $25 million a year is spent by Rainier Valley area residents outside their own neighborhood, according to SouthEast Effective Development.

One stumbling block in attracting new retailers is the difficulty in assembling land for development on Rainier Avenue South, says Sue Cary, SEED's housing development manager. The organization has been thwarted in pulling together enough property for a second phase of construction north of Rainier Valley Square.

Several purchase options on land at the site had to be dropped because SEED could not gain control of all the small parcels needed for the proposed mall, Cary says.