Cedartown Commission approves six month moratorium on allowing new convenience stores, vape shops to open

Just like the previous moratorium on new mini warehouses being built in the city limits caused a change to zoning rules, expect the same to happen for convenience stores after approval of a pause on allowing this specific type of new business to open within city limits.

Commissioners voted unanimously to approve the city administration’s request as they work out new guidelines for convenience stores and where they should be located within city limits. The hope is to avoid what has been happening: a glut of stores opening in clusters along some of the city’s busiest spots, while leaving other areas completely under or unserved.

Why is this happening?

The city wants to avoid having too many stores after there’s already 29 retail outlets within the city operating as convenience stores in one capacity or another, and of those 14 are gas stations. The other 15 are purely convenience stores or those that also sell meat.

Those figures don’t include stores that are within reach of customers in the city limits, but sit outside.

A good example: the Gulf gas station on South Main Street sits outside the city limits, but the Cedartown Grocery and Tobacco just a few blocks up the road are within the city limits.

13 of the stores run from the intersection of North Main Street and the bypass to the city limits on South Main Street.

Three are within spitting distance of one another in that corridor just on North Main Street and down South Main Street. The same applies to West Avenue – which has a nine different stores from South College Street to Prior Station Road.

Three more are in close proximity on East Avenue just across the viaduct, with a new one that just opened.

The remainder just within the city limits are located on Prior Station Road and at the intersection of Sixth Street and West Girard Avenue.

What concerns the city is the concentration of stores, and that stores are opening in buildings never intended for the purpose. For instance, The old Pizza Hut became a convenience store – the Lucky Food Mart – on North Main Street after it closed.

City officials reported that after the Dairy Queen closed, interest was shown in turning it into a convenience store as well.

Avoiding a saturation in the marketplace is one reason why the measure is being taken to post a moratorium on new convenience stores and vape shops, but also to give the city time to figure out a coherent response to avoid the potential issues in the future.

Commissioner Sam Branch had a lot to say about the moratorium during his comments as the meeting was coming to a close for the public on Monday evening.

First and foremost: “We are convenience stored out!”

“I will be very blunt: We are convenience stored out. Edward has to be very careful when he says stuff, but I don’t. We are convenience stored out. There are certain things we can and cannot do to help whether we want those types of businesses or not,” Branch said. “However, every business that opens their doors to the public faces the same thing: they have to make money to exist. If you don’t like the business, don’t give them your money. I promise you, if you are as tired of convenience stores as I am, when a new one opens their doors and you don’t think we need another one, don’t spend your money there. It’s that simple They won’t stay open forever, because they have to make money.”

“I applaud people for wanting to be entrepreneurs and wanting to live the American dream, but man, we are convenience stored out,” he ended his statement on Monday.

City officials expect to be able to announce a plan before the moratorium runs heading into 2024.