Is Second Saturday Still Happening In Beacon? Post-Pandemic, Where Are We?

I know…in the olden days, those dark days during the height of the pandemic in New York (thank you everyone for being so respectful so that we could crush the curve!) days lost their meanings. Second Saturdays used to be one of the heaviest days in Beacon. Art galleries would launch their new exhibits, shops would do discounts, restaurants may offer live music, and A Little Beacon Blog used to open pop-up shops in the space that we occupied back then on Main Street (we had sadly vacated just before the pandemic hit).

To be honest, from a marketing standpoint, Second Saturday was quite a crowded day. We wondered if launching events on other Saturdays might be the way to go. We tried convincing our pop-up shop rental clients of this approach, but they would not be deterred. People wanted their Second Saturdays!

When events and shopping halted, so did the art exhibits. And so did A Little Beacon Blog’s monthly hunting for art exhibit openings that our editor, Catherine Sweet, a veteran Beaconite who moved back to her home state of CA but could not release the Art Gallery in her heart, would write up dutifully every month. However, A Little Beacon Blog’s sales decreased as our event income disappeared, and some advertisers paused (but not all! thank you advertisers!!).

Yet, there were no events, and Catherine is a mother of a young child, and she, like all parents, was drowning in no childcare, which was life back then when everything shut down and parents who worked from home could barely function. I’m not sure if we are even functioning now, come to think of it, in summer and in between camp drop-offs, college visits, and vacays.

Fast Forward To Today’s Saturday

Fast forward to today, and Beacon is bustling! Safely because you all wear your masks (you who refuse or are lying about your vaccinations…we’ll just put you to the side). And safely because businesses are able to make their own rules now, and good customers respect them (unlike those of you who are unruly, and you can just keep yourself on the train and get off at a different stop).

Art galleries seem to be inclined to have Second Saturday’s. We have not checked with the official leaders of this movement, BeaconArts, as this article went up too quickly, but they most likely have an opinion.

Here at A Little Beacon Blog, we want to continue promoting the art exhibits as best we can. In order to do that, we need to open up our advertising platform to art galleries - the same one that shops and restaurants have access to. It is a discounted subscription model that can allow for the listing of an event or marketing message each week in A Little Beacon Blog’s weekend newsletter. We want to pay Catherine the money she deserves! And we need a little extra to pay ourselves (Teslie and Katie both work here each day, and we have student loans, childcare, car payments, rent, mortgage, utility bills all the things).

As an art gallery, if you want to list your events or exciting anythings each week, you can do that in our Art Gallery Sponsor program here. If you are a business or individual who is not an artist, but wants to support each month, you can do so as well here.

If you are a location like a barber shop, who once a month or once in a blue moon hosts an artist, then please submit your event to us. A Little Beacon Blog always has a soft spot for true pop-ups. A “true” pop-up is something that pops up in a very unusual, unrelated location. Like an artist in a barber shop. Or a clothing shop in a barber shop. Both of which have happened!

Thank you so much for your consideration.