Storefronts on College Street in downtown Auburn say they expect this football season to bring robust sales back with full attendance in Jordan-Hare Stadium, more students back on campus and the reappearance of tailgaters. Some stores said they were already seeing this weekend's influx of visitors for tonight's first home game against Akron as early as Thursday.
"We started seeing [customers] Thursday; I think the anticipation of this long holiday weekend and the first game some people have gone to in two years is part of it," said Trey Johnston, retired CEO of J&M Bookstore who still manages the store part-time. "I think people were excited."
Johnston said last year's football season saw sales decrease by 42% because of lower numbers of people in Auburn for games with COVID-19 restrictions in place and said the store often had stronger business on Saturdays of bye weeks or during away games. He expects sales patterns to largely return to normal for merchants downtown but noted his store was experiencing some delays in receiving stock because of manufacturing delays.
"I'm having some supply chain problems getting product in the house," Johnston said. "With stuff I ordered in January [and] February in anticipation, the reps are calling and saying 'You've got to back it up six weeks.'"
He said the store might not have its fully ordered inventory until October, but he doesn't expect this to impact sales for popular items. Johnston said white clothing was the hot ticket item this weekend and was already selling well on Friday since tonight's game is a "white out" game.
Cliff Hare, co-owner of Auburn Art, said his store was also seeing the rush of customers starting Friday morning and had made 43 sales by about 3 p.m.
"I would at least quadruple that number for just people in-store right now traffic wise, because typically everybody that comes in has at least two people, sometimes four," Hare said Friday afternoon. "I might have had 200 people so far. [Saturday] it will be probably 200 people an hour."
Hare said he wasn't sure if seeing the wave of fall business bounce back this year was a guarantee with uncertainty of whether Auburn University's COVID-19 guidelines would be altered with the delta variant of the coronavirus impacting the Southeast.
"I think there were times when everybody in town that I spoke with ... [was] wondering with the delta variant if they end up saying, 'Actually, we've got to have this capacity,'" he said. "Everybody just assumed since they already announced it that it'd be really hard to go back [on policies].
Auburn Art was the first business in the city to sign a name, image or likeness deal with Tigers QB Bo Nix, with an autographed football currently available for purchase in the store. Hare said NIL products are an exciting new business venture for the store he's looking forward to offering customers starting this season.
"We're right now kind of playing with some other players and talking to them to maybe see if we can get some other signatures from a few other football guys and some basketball folks, too," he said.
Customers fill J&M Bookstore on South College Street ahead of the football game against Akron on Sept. 4, 2021, in Auburn, Ala.
J&M Bookstore and Auburn Art will not be open on Labor Day, their owners said, but the Mellow Mushroom location downtown hopes to welcome in weekend holdovers on Monday for pizza and drinks before they leave town.
"We're just going to stay open until everybody's fed," said Adam Nemeroff, general manager of Mellow Mushroom in Auburn.
Nemeroff said the restaurant plans to stay open slightly longer tonight until 9:30 or 10 p.m. given the larger volume of customers in town, and later this season he anticipates to see the greatest number of customers since the start of the pandemic with more significant games like the Iron Bowl.
"We didn't really get that last year so we're ready for that this year," he said. "We get a couple small games and a couple away games leading up to those [big games] so we should be well practiced and ready to go by then."
A sign on Mellow Mushroom's front window indicates the restaurant is in need of kitchen staff, but Nemeroff said the restaurant is ready for all those visiting this weekend.
"We're hiring folks pretty much all over the place, [but] we're about as ready as we can be," he said. "We have had to make some adjustments here and there kind of as we go, which is the norm now."
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Tim Nail, senior in journalism, is the community editor of The Auburn Plainsman.
