One Hot Cookie to Add Austintown Library Location
AUSTINTOWN, Ohio -- One Hot Cookie plans a February opening date for its second location, inside the Austintown branch of the Public Library of Youngstown and Mahoning County.
Offerings at the new store will mirror those of the original location, which opened last year in Erie Terminal Place in downtown Youngstown, said owner Bergen Giordani. Those include traditional and specialty cookies, ice cream, milk, soft drinks and coffee.
Giordani said she was approached by the library system’s executive director, Heidi Daniel, “a customer and a fan of One Hot Cookie,” a few months ago about taking over the vacant café space at the Austintown library.
“The Austintown library was built for a café to be in this space and it’s been several years since we’ve been able to offer that service to our customers,” Daniel said. Because the café space isn’t designed with a full kitchen, any business that comes in needs to be “relatively contained,” she noted.
“It seems like it’s such an exciting business, really fresh and new, and we think it’ll be something that our customers will enjoy. We hope it’ll attract new people and it fits into the space that we have existing really well,” Daniel said.
“It seemed like a natural fit,” Giordani said. Due to its proximity to the Austintown Local Schools campus, the library gets a lot of after-school traffic from youth, “a growing segment of our market,” she added. "They also do a lot of Mommy and Me story time programs in the morning."
In addition, “We get a lot of older adults who come in, maybe have coffee, read a newspaper, read and book,” Daniel said. The library’s facilities’ personnel are preparing the 150-square-foot space for occupancy by the business, Daniel said.
Staffing and hours are still being worked out for the location. “Our hours will vary based on events happening at the library and then we’ll have set hours that we’re open every day,” Giordani said.
Business at the flagship location continues to grow. "We had tremendous Christmas and holiday season,” she reported. “We’re looking forward to bigger and better things coming in the spring to the downtown location.”
Copyright 2014 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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