Vendors named for Sixth Avenue District

The first four vendors for Pine Bluff’s Sixth Avenue District were introduced Tuesday inside the UAPB Business Support Incubator.

Anthony and Wendy Smith, Kiara Ford, Gladys Foots and Lamar Stith will set up their restaurants at the new food and retail center scheduled to be completed by May 2024. Their restaurants will be housed in an old warehouse — which was topped off after the announcement behind the incubator, near the old Simmons Bank drive-thru on Sixth Avenue — and is part of the Sixth and Main Plaza that is a major project of Go Forward Pine Bluff.

More than just an opportunity for the private-public tax initiative to create another hub of commerce, each of the restaurateurs are also given the opportunity to settle their businesses downtown with the possibility of future growth.

“In terms of what we hoped to accomplish, these people would have a leased term annually to get them to establish business credit and tax returns and show their profit margins,” Go Forward CEO Ryan Watley said. “If they can do that, the buildings that are downtown, Urban Renewal also has access to those, and we can still give them a favorable lease to where they can go into those buildings. It’s a great project for building people.”

Watley said a committee of citizens formed by The Generator and UAPB incubator selected the finalists from a pool of applicants. The finalists were chosen based on who was most ready to be incubated, he explained.

“All of these people have done some type of food business,” Watley said. “That’s part of the reason why they rose to the top. We’ll see how well they do.”

For Stith, owner of Kultural Kreations by Lamar, it’s an opportunity he didn’t think he’d have without the Sixth Avenue District.

“Secondly, it was a part of the program you guys aren’t able to see where we’re interacting with other entrepreneurs on how to hone our business skills or social media skills. That part of people building was important for me,” Stith said.

Watley estimated the cost of the project at $5 million — $3 million of which, he said, came from private funding.

“If we only relied on tax dollars, we wouldn’t be able to do this,” Watley said, answering a public question from noted Go Forward opponent John Fenley. Go Forward is seeking to renew its five-eighths-cent general sales-and-use tax and add a three-eighths-cent tax to benefit firefighters and police officers in the Nov. 14 general election, five months after voters narrowly defeated both margins.

Foots will operate Marie’s Catfish at the Sixth Avenue District. The Smiths will run the Breakfast Stop.

The Smiths set their vision for their restaurant two years ago, Anthony said.

“This is great because it gives the grounding for the vision to expound on,” he said. “I look forward to the expansion and growth. We love people. We love cooking good food, and giving back to the community.”

Wendy Smith said she and Anthony were operating a large food truck, which resulted in a high overhead of costs. Being able to operate the Breakfast Stop in a set-stone building, she said, is a blessing.

For Ford, who operates Oasis Catering, her mission is giving back the love, not just good customer service and food.

“As a business owner trying to grow, as a minority in the area that we’re in, we have to have resources to grow,” said Ford, who by day is the Pine Bluff School District chef. ”So, yes, we want to start and be successful, but we have to have those tools to be successful. This program is allowing us to operate our business and own our tools to be successful.”

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story incorrectly named Anthony and Wendy Smith’s food service. The business is known as the Breakfast Stop.