KANSAS CITY, Mo — First Fridays returns in the Kansas City Crossroads as businesses in the historic neighborhood react to the election results.
From now until October on the first Friday of every month, the Crossroads neighborhood welcomes thousands of people from all over the metro to come out and celebrate its art scene.
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"It's a huge day for us every month, and it really depends on the season, but you know, April, May, June are typically the really big ones," explained Jeff Evans, owner of Mean Mule.
Mean Mule is located at 17th and Locust. Its location would have been blocks away from the proposed downtown ballpark and Evans believes his business would have been impacted because First Fridays draws in a large number of people to their business and at times staff and customers have a hard time finding parking.
Evans says if the Royals were to move to the Crossroads, parking could have been an issue if a Royals game coincided with a First Fridays.
"My advice is to always get down early because 10,000 people have come down for First Friday, shuts the city down, " explained Evans, "get down here early because parking gets used up immediately."
Now that the stadium sales tax failed, Evans is hoping to use this upcoming First Friday as a way to engage with new customers and hold on to the attention the Crossroads has received.
"We're in this weird zone now, where there's been a lot of attention on this area and we don't want to see that attention go anywhere else because there's great things and amazing things we're going to do down here," said Evans.
KSHB-TV spoke with the Crossroads Community Association who helps promote First Fridays. Board member and spokesperson for CCA, David Johnson believes this Friday will be a chance for the entire community to look into what's next for the neighborhood.
"I think it's fair to say there's a little bit of a sigh of relief, not necessarily that people wanted it to fail, but just that there was some sort of conclusion, because it was a big stressor for the neighborhood and it was testing a lot of relationships," said Johnson.
Mean Mule is planning on doinggiveaways and free merchandise this Friday, a way to thank the community for it's ongoing support.
"We're more than blessed to have that support and to have customers that love the area in Kansas City spoke that's a big deal because we didn't really know what was gonna happen," said Evans.
KSHB-TV has previously covered First Fridays and many business in the Crossroads have stated they stay open late to cash in on this event and reported First Friday is their highest day in sales every month.
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