'No brainer' decisions paying off for businesses catering to Okanagan Rail Trail
Two new businesses – a craft brewery and craft coffee shop – took a chance in the last year on locating next to the Okanagan Rail Trail near its Kelowna end.
They both saw the huge potential of capitalizing on heavy Rail Trail traffic just east of Gordon Drive where the trail splits to the North End of the city with another spur to the Cawston Avenue cycle path.
“I was just doing some projects around here and seeing the traffic, pedestrians, young people, old people, cyclists, skateboarders, rollerbladers, you name it,” Rob Leinemann told iNFOnews.ca. “I went: ‘Holy cow! This is a really good location.’ For me it was a no brainer, just because of the traffic coming by here.”
“Here” is on High Road, just east of Gordon Drive and fronting on the Rail Trail next to busy Cawston Avenue.
It helped that Leinemann’s family owns the small mall and he worked there for a few years before branching off with partner Matt Grieve so create Railside Brewing.
Grieve is an electrician and Leinemann is a carpenter so they built 95% of the shop themselves, which meant they were around for months before opening on Aug. 5, 2022.
That activity drew more interest and a small hub was soon borne.
“When I was walking along the Rail Trail myself, I just saw so much potential,” Taylor MacInnis told iNFOnews. “I noticed Railside was doing some construction on the building that they’re in now so I just got a little nosy and poked my head in there and said: ‘Hey. What are you doing?’
“They were so kind and answered all my questions. I said you guys got such a good location. They said there’s one of the little units opening up. When he told me one was opening up, I called the landlord right away and just signed the contract that day because I just knew the potential.”
On January 28 she and partner Aaron Moore opened Craft 42 Roasters. While it’s only open weekends until May, and until after MacInnis has her second baby, it’s already a success.
“It’s been amazing,” MacInnies said. “We didn’t put a whole lot of marketing out there, we just wanted it to kind of trickle through. For the most part, everyone is walking up or biking up or scootering up. It’s so exciting to see. They come up with their dog or they come up with their stroller. People are going out of their way coming off the Rail Trail to come in.”
For them, people coming by foot or bike rather than car suits their environmental outlook.
Craft 42 started about 1.5 years ago as an online coffee business with the thought of, some day, having a retail outlet.
“I said to my business partner/partner in life that I wanted to only do brick and mortar unless it was a perfect location,” MacInnis said. “I didn’t want to open it in any random location. When I found this location, being on the Rail Trail, I thought this was literally perfect.”
READ MORE: Kelowna craft coffee shop following in the wine tasting tradition of the Okanagan
When Leinemann and Grieve planned their Railside Brewing, the original concept was to be railway themed.
“It became quickly apparent that we really needed to focus on cyclists and rail trail users,” Grieve said.
Which means their parking lot is full of bike racks and no parking signs.
Their beer has a railway theme with names like Smokestack Stout and Boxcar Amber Ale but bicycle themed names are likely in the works for this summer.
They also have some rail tracks they plan to install as foot rests but, at 300 pounds each, that’s going to take some extra help.
While working on the roof last Canada Day, Grieve estimated 5,000 people passed by on the Rail Trail, many of them asking when they were opening.
“Half our business is the Rail Trail, absolutely,” Grieve said. “And, in winter, a lot of locals from across Clement (Avenue) come in. It’s a five or 10 minute walk for them. It was definitely an aspect that we hadn’t planned on was how many locals lived right here and the Rail Trail just made it more accessible.”
People are walking in from as far away as the Apple Bowl area, many likely coming only because they don’t have to drive.
The surge in popularity of e-bikes has helped bring in people from high elevation subdivisions like Wilden.
“On a traditional bike, those people would never come here,” Grieve said. “You can bike down the hill but, you’re not going to have a beer or two and then bike back up. They get on their e-bikes and it’s perfect. That’s another portion of business that we didn’t expect.”
Railside is a bit outside Kelowna’s brewery district but close enough to keep in contact.
“The good thing is, a lot of people who are doing a brewery hop, they often look to start here, which is good, because we don’t want them on the other end,” Leinemann said, noting it’s only a six-minute walk to Unleashed or The Office brew pubs.
And, while a cycle tour of the brewery district is not really worthwhile, adding in Railside changes that dynamic.
“When me and my girlfriend and her kids were biking around downtown, we were going to do a little bike tour of the breweries,” Grieve said. “It was – ride for a couple minutes, park your bike and go in for a beer. So, for us now, if you want to do a little bit of biking too, it’s a little more of a trek to get down to us so it makes it a destination.”
Last summer they reached capacity a couple of times and that may be a challenge this year since they’re better known.
Leinemann was a little worried that they might run low on beer but has now got all their kegs filled, and just in time.
“Two weeks ago, on the Sunday afternoon, our bike racks were full,” he said.
“An interesting dynamic for us is, early in March when it was still cold out, we would get 10 to 12 people on the patio because they were out walking the trail and they were dressed for outside so they didn’t want to be inside because they were too warm,” Grieve added.
Even in the dead of winter, with a foot of snow on the ground, people were using the Rail Trail to commute to work by bike but, usually, not stopping for a brew.
“Then, as soon as the snow was gone, we started with one, two, three bikes out there,” Grieve said.
“When we first started talking about this, I said to Rob: ‘I think we need to be more downtown with the other ones,’” Grieve added. “He said: ‘Just come and spend a day here.’ It didn’t take long and I went: ‘Wow. We just need to get a small percentage of the people going by us.’ It didn’t take long to see, this is the spot.”
These are rare businesses on the Rail Trail, likely, they said, because there are not many commercial properties right next to the trail.
READ MORE: Okanagan rail trails great for locals but could be better for business, tourists
At the other end, 52 km away where the Rail Trail starts in Coldstream, there’s the Rail Trail Café that Brady Brassart's family bought in 2022 after it was converted from the Kal General Store.
"They (previous owners) were part of the process of the plan and obviously saw the goal of what it could be," Brassart told iNFOnews.ca "They did a very good job of transforming our location into something that is a very cool unique spot in history in the city of Coldstream and Vernon."
The family also owns the Kalavida Surf Shop next door that rents bikes so there's a heavy traffic in rentals and people dropping in for a bite to eat at the start or end of their trip along the Rail Trail.
There's not really any other businesses catering to the culinary needs of Rail Trail users, other than the Oyama General Store that's about half-way between Rail Trail Cafe and Railside Brewing.
Oyama General Store owner Cory Holland, who has been there since 2003, was skeptical about the Rail Trail at first but, when he talked to iNFOnews.ca two years ago, he was pleasantly surprised by the pickup in business.
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