Small Things: Third Time's the Charm

Third time’s the charm – or at least I hope it is when it comes to finding and staying in a good location for Small Things: Cats and Books.

Small Things started in September of 2009 as an Arts, Books, Crafts and Delights (candy and coffee) shop – with a store cat named Smudge. I mean what’s a book store without a store cat?

We loved our spot in the Southside Business Centre – a five-minute drive (at least from my house), great neighbours, free parking, and affordable rent.

There was a problem – signage. There was no room for a sign for Small Things on the landlord’s current sign. No problem initially – I just put out an A-frame. Then a big problem – bylaw informed us that our little two-by-three-foot sign contravenes city bylaws, and our landlord was not willing to help us by extending her sign – even if I paid for it. Sigh!

Thankfully, a new landlord appeared on the scene – Tyler – and he was willing to sublet to us at price not much more than we were already paying. And it had what we now considered the usual benefits – a five-minute drive from my place, great neighbours (his roofing company), free parking (except when he was selling Christmas Trees), affordable rent PLUS better signage, double the footage, space to hold our garage sales (to raise money for the spay neuter fund) and huge windows for folks to look into and the cats to look out of.

Yes, the nature of our not-for-profit changed over the course of two years. Turns out there is not much demand –at least from our little shop – for local arts, crafts and delights. So we refocused. We continued with new books by local authors and used books, plus we added more cats for adoption and cat-themed gifts and kitsch.

I have to say, we did better in our new location at the corner of Yale and Regent, in that more cats got adopted. More folks learned about us, and we were able to add to our wee group of volunteers. There were disadvantages – the building was cold, there was no hot water, and no garbage removal. And the signage didn’t work as well as I hoped it would.

Still, we would have stayed there forever - save that Tyler found that having a public space for his roofing business didn’t increase business enough to warrant keeping the space, and we could not afford to rent the whole space on our own.

Thankfully, again, a new landlord appeared on the scene. Mark was introduced to us by one of Tyler’s helpers and he invited us to see a new space he was opening up at 253-B Hazel St. – beside Extreme Pizza One, across from the Nickel City Hotel. We were very grateful. It’s hard to find affordable, street-level space in Sudbury near the South End that permits cats. Landlords find it hard to believe we limit ourselves to eight cats – and that we, ourselves, cannot stand the smell of dirty litter boxes, hence are scrupulous about scooping and cleaning.

At the time of writing this, there are some definite disadvantages. It’s farther from my home (though closer for others), parking is on the street and not in a lot, the sound-proofing between our unit and our one neighbour is non-existent (which is not a problem for us, but…), and the rent is more.

Plus, while the other two spaces we rented were ready-to-go, this one needs a lot of work. Cleaning, gutting, redoing, priming, painting, electrical, and so on. But I’m happy – and so are my fellow volunteers. Why? There is something about making a space one's own that is very satisfying, even though it is time consuming and costly. We now have a great signage option – once we figure out an affordable and adorable way to do it. There is lots of quirky space in there for us to store things and for cats to explore. And it’s a stone’s throw from the Nickel City Tavern and Extreme Pizza One. Yum! Yum!

Will we refocus our business again with this move? A little. We want to push the Cat Café aspect a little more – having this groovy space promotes a more avant-garde feeling. I am hoping that the big sign we’ll eventually put up on the corner of Lorne and Hazel will lead to more cat adoptions. And I know there is an additional element that is unique and will help pay the rent. We just don’t know what it is yet. If you have suggestions, I’m open to them.

Cats and books will continue to be our main features – especially the cats. I mean, what’s a cat store without books.

Jan Carrie Steven is a volunteer with Cat Adoption Trust Sudbury (CATS) and the co-ordinator of Small Things: Cats & Books. For more information, go to www.smallthings.ca.