Downtown Revitalization

Changing the Visitor’s Experience

Attract more visitors.

Secure more businesses.

Generate more tax revenue.

Downtown DNA main street

On-Site Audits: To determine your community’s health

How healthy is your downtown?

Find out what’s working for you and/or against you. Our experts will determine strengths, weaknesses and areas of opportunities to help you make informed and effective decisions when it comes to updating your image, identity, brand, signage, building façades, streetscape amenities, and business mix.

Click here to read more about our four valuable audits and consults.

City on Display

Attractions: What’s your sticky factor?

What brings customers downtown? Destination retail, unique food offerings, cool art installations that represent your community’s offerings, programmed green spaces, and heritage centers that provide amazing visitor experiences. These are what get people moving, shopping, sharing, and coming back again and again. Our team can identify, create, and help implement all of these vital components.

Windows of Opportunity

Ugly (vacant) Ducklings

Tired of having to deal with dark empty storefronts, dirty alleys, and unused green space? Can’t get your merchants to improve their window displays? Bring our ‘display brigade’ to town and watch the transformation begin. They’ll clean up, dress up, and lighten up all your eyesores. Watch them create some visual magic in your downtown!

Click here to view vacant windows we have transformed.

Click here to view storefronts we have designed.

Up Your Alleys main street

Illuminate Dark Spaces

Most alleyways are dark, dirty, (sometimes dangerous) and foreboding corridors. Many are hardly ever used as thoroughfares anymore and they aren’t maintained. Why not turn these empty spaces into welcoming passageways? Clean them up, illuminate them and add some decorative elements to bring them back to life. Retailworks, Inc can help you shed light on these dark spaces with the addition of planters, florals, colorful wall murals, brick pavers, lighting and more.

branded seasonal decor

A United Downtown: Branded seasonal Decor

Cohesive branding efforts can strengthen the messaging of your downtown as a whole, benefiting all local businesses. Our Branded Seasonal Decor (a series of custom designed window decals and coordinated window displays), and a community-wide sign plan will help your downtown make a bigger visual impact.

Click here to see Eagle River, WI.

Click here to see Whitefish Bay, WI.

24 48 hour main street makeover

Design & Merchandising Makeovers

Need an injection of quick results in your downtown? Ask us about our “48-Hour” and “24-Hour” Makeovers for small businesses. Be part of the planning and makeover process, then alert the media for ribbon-cutting. They are great community-building activities!

Click here to check out our 48-hour makeovers!

Click here to check out our 24-hour makeovers!

Informative & Inspirational Seminars

A few minutes with Lyn Falk, and you’ll realize she truly lives and breathes retail. You’ll also realize meeting someone with her depth of knowledge and over 35 years of experience is hard to find. An international speaker, she is often asked to return to give an encore performance (click here for a list) Lyn has turned her experience into inspiring and digestible seminars. She has streamlined her research and distilled the information into actionable items so main street directors and main street merchants can breathe new life into the hearts of their downtowns.

Seminar topics include:

  • Revitalizing Your Downtown Image/Brand
  • Creating a Memorable Downtown Experience
  • Creating a Profitable Retail/Business Image & Interior
  • Proven Display Tactics & Visual Merchandising Techniques

Click here for Lyn Falk’s Bio and more topics.

  • “Lyn Falk is one of our favorite and most requested consultants. She has done a great job with presentations and one–on–one consultations with businesses. I see the results of her work every time I am in a Main Street community that has used her services.”

    Jim Engle
    Director of Wisconsin Main Street Program
  • “Thank you with all my heart for the genuine work you provided our business owners this week. We are so fortunate to have had you come to town and look at us from a new perspective! Your expertise and sincere interest in each business were so apparent. Thank you very much, Lyn!”

    Sue Besser
    Executive Director of Downtown Rhinelander, Wisconsin
  • “I love Lyn!…I could not have been more pleased with your selection of Lyn Falk to work with my downtown!…I am not artistically inclined and never held a view of what really can influence a customer or purchase through good design.”

    Barb Nelson
    Director of Monroe Main Street, Monroe, Wisconsin
  • “…we received some great feedback from your workshop and consultations. Local business owners were able to walk away with actionable advice on how to improve sales and profits in their retail stores. Hope to see you again soon!”

    Greg Bouhl
    Director of Entrepreneurship & Business Development, Southern Illinois University - Office of Innovation and Economic Development

Main Street Client List

*multiple visits

Downtown Business Districts –  In Wisconsin

Algoma
Appleton
Ashland

Beloit
Black River
Brillion
Cedarburg
Chippewa Falls
Columbus
Darlington
De Pere

Eagle River*
Elkhorn
Ellsworth
Elroy
Fond du Lac*
Green Bay*
Hurley
Kenosha*

LaCrosse
Lake Mills*
Land O’ Lakes
Madison*

Marshfield*
Mauston
Menomonee Falls
Menomonie
Merrill
Middleton
Milwaukee*
Monona
Monroe*
Osceola*
Platteville
Plymouth
Port Washington*
Portage*
Prairie du Chien*
Racine
Rhinelander
Rice Lake*
Richland Center*
Ripon*
Sheboygan Falls*
Shorewood
Sparta
Stevens Point
 
Sturgeon Bay*
Tomah
Two Rivers*
Viroqua*
Waterford
Watertown*
Waukesha*
Waupun*
Wausau*
Wauwatosa, WI
West Allis*
Whitefish Bay
Whitewater

Downtown Business Districts – Outside of Wisconsin

Bloomfield, IA
Burlington, IA
Carbondale, IL*
Centerville, IA
Chariton, IA
Cleveland, OH
Deadwood, SD

Dover, NH
Florida State
Freeport, IL
Gettysburg, PA
Grosse Pointe, MI
Keokuk, IA

Jacksonville, IL (statewide presentation)
Libertyville, IL (statewide presentation)
Menominee, MI
Murphysboro, IL
Niles, MI*
Sioux City, IA (statewide presentation)

Wauseca, MN
Westfield, NJ
Wheeling, WV

Lyn has been a presenter at the following National Main Street Conferences

Boston, MA, 2000, 2023
Virtual Conference, 2021
Kansas City, MO, 2018
Pittsburgh, PA, 2017
Milwaukee, WI, 2016
Atlanta, GA, 2015
Detroit, MI, 2014

Expand your mind today for a more profitable tomorrow

Topics include:

  • Store Designs that Move Minds & Merchandise – Designing a profitable retail interior for YOUR target market
  • Creating a Powerful Customer Experience
  • Turning Vacant Storefronts into Windows of Opportunity 
  • Proven Display Tactics and Visual Merchandising Techniques
  • Finding your “Sticky Factor” and Creating a Memorable Brand for your Downtown (it’s more than a new logo!)
  • Creating a Memorable Downtown Experience
  • The New Design Paradigm Based on the Immutable Laws of Nature – Understanding Left-Brain, Right-Brain Decision Making (CEU credits available for Interior Designers)

Or, we are happy to create a seminar to fit your audience’s specific needs.

main street business owner
main street logo
main street business owner
main street business owner
main street business owner
main street business owner

Are you ready to turn your downtown into a destination?