Where there’s no smoke, there’s business in Palmer

PALMER — Seated at the far end of the Palmer Bar Thursday night, Mindy and Joel Stefanski sipped drinks and read the menu.

“I haven’t been in here for 20 years because of the smoke,” Joel said.

Mindy read about the cash mob in the Frontiersman Tuesday and mentioned to her husband they should leave the cooking to someone else and give the bar’s kitchen a try.

“Because it’s smoke free, now we have the opportunity to enjoy the best kept secret that’s always been here,” Joel said.

An initiative Palmer voters passed in October 2012 prohibits smoking in public places, such as the Palmer Bar, which converted to smoke-free Jan. 2.

A little more than two weeks hence, co-owner Mary Lou Coddington said it’s too soon to tell what the change will mean to the downtown business she’s owned with son Jack Burnett for more than 27 years.

“So far it’s been pretty good,” she said. “May and June, then we will know.”

Regulars said it looked more like a standing room only New Year’s Eve crowd at the Palmer Bar than a typical Thursday night.

Coddington said usually she’d have two people working on a Thursday, last night there were five.

Personally, she says she’s a fan of the change. She said she doesn’t smoke and doesn’t like the smell of smoke. Coddington said the fight she put up in against the initiative was about her rights as a business owner, not the smoking initiative per se.

“So far I love it,” Coddington said.

Regular and asthma sufferer Denise Dunnigan grew up in the Valley and has spent many nights at the Palmer Bar playing the jukebox, sipping drinks, eating and visiting with friends.

“It’s absolutely a world of difference for my lungs,” she said.

Through the glass window, behind its neon sign, gathered clusters of smokers lighting up, talking, laughing.

Dunnigan said before the New Year her boyfriend would have been among the smokers gathered Thursday out there on the sidewalk. But since he recently gave up smoking and loves to shoot pool, the change is ideal for them.

Longtime Valley business owner John Klapperich had “Cash Mob DPMA” stickers made and passed them out to patrons to mark their cash or credit card receipts as a way to show the ripple impact the night of fun means for the region’s economy.

Klapperich said the whole idea is that a lot of few hundred local people spending a little bit of money locally has a big economic impact. Here’s how it works: multiply the 200 people at the first cash mob by the $20 each person was asked to spend. Them multiply that $4,000 by 10 because each dollar spent locally is estimated to be spent and spent again seven to 10 times before leaving the local economy, Klapperich said.

A little quick math shows how $20 spent at Coddington’s bar becomes a $40,000 economic ripple, he said.

These cash mob events were organized by Palmer Downtown Merchants Association to showcase the business community. One is planned each month for the rest of 2013, said organizer Denise Statz.

Every third Thursday of each month this year the association has planned similar cash mob events to bring local people together to eat, drink and spend locally at a different Palmer business. Check the Smoke Free Palmer Mob Facebook page for updates on where the group will meet each month.