Amidst changes from Project Downtown Pullman, businesses struggle to maintain good spirits as the city fights to keep up morale.

On Oct. 11, the Pullman Batting Cages officially closed after being open since August 2023. Crystal Helenske, one of the former owners along with her husband and in-laws, said the decision to close the business was a result of the divorce of her mother-in-law and father-in-law. This, coupled with the difficulties the business faced, spurred the decision.

“For everyone involved, especially because the business wasn’t doing well, it was in everybody’s best interest that it closed,” she said.

For the Pullman Batting Cages, things ran smoothly in the beginning while issues gradually arose due to canceled memberships, Helenske said.

“We were super busy [with] pre-season baseball, and then naturally it kind of just died off,” she said. “People are busy with baseball and travel ball, and all of those memberships got canceled and we went back to not being able to even break even by a long shot.”

The Pullman Batting Cages is not the only business to close in recent months, as the Village Center Cinemas, Pullman Building Supply and the YMCA have also closed this year.

Marie Dymkoski, Pullman Chamber of Commerce executive director, said a common driver may be rising costs in Washington. Business regulations and restrictions also make it harder for local owners to run their businesses.

“We have some of the highest fuel costs in the country, and certainly in our region, and all those things trickle down,” she said. “So if the consumer has less money in their pocket and they’re not able to spend it, or they are going to places where it’s cheaper, and in this case, it’s across the border in Idaho, where they have the lowest minimum wage in the country and may be easier to do business.”

Lower enrollment rates at WSU are also likely hurting local businesses, she said.

“Our businesses are feeling it … they feel the lack of students,” she said. “Some of the businesses have not recovered from COVID where we had no students, or very few that hung around.”

While a lack of student customers was not necessarily an issue for the Pullman Batting Cages, seasonal issues and a lack of traffic contributed to its closure, Helenske said.

“The weather warmed up and our traffic really died down, and it stayed down,” she said. “[We] just went, Well, it’s gonna be easier for us to kind of just pull the plug.”

Ultimately, while it was not an ideal situation, the decision to close the business was in the best interest of the family, Helenske said.

“It’s unfortunate for the community. We would have given it a few more years if we would have been able to sustain it, [but] for the slower months, I don’t know,” she said. “It went from, We’re gonna come help you a couple times a month, to literally me and my husband, and we have three kids. We both work full time to try to keep it afloat, and it was just like, this was too much.”

Fortunately for Pullman, not all of the changes happening for local businesses are negative or permanent. Despite putting Cougar Country Drive-In and Zoe Coffee & Kitchen up for sale in September, owners Mike and Terry Wagoner assure customers that both restaurants will continue.

Having run these businesses for at least 20 years, Wagoner said he and his wife felt it was time to retire.

“In 10 years I’ll be 81, and the thought of that, just wow,” he said. “Now’s the time to do the things that we wanted to do, visit places, hang out with our kids, not get up and get out of the house if we don’t want to that day.”

While the businesses have not yet been purchased, customers can be assured that neither Cougar Country Drive-In nor Zoe Coffee & Kitchen will be closing anytime soon, nor will much change when the businesses are eventually purchased, Wagoner said.

“At first, I didn’t want it to be known publicly … because I was concerned about our business and people [saying], Oh, they’re shutting down,’” he said. “We’re not shutting down.”

The Wagoners made sure to include their employees for both Zoe and Cougar Country in the process and reassure them as well, he said.

“[We] assured them that they didn’t have anything to worry about. We wouldn’t sell it to any jerks,” he said. “I just want to make sure my people are taken care of, [it’s a] big concern for me. They were all on board with that and they’re all rooting for us, we really love all those guys.”

While Zoe and Cougar Country have not necessarily been impacted by issues specific to Pullman, they have felt the effects of inflation and rising costs, Wagoner said.

“In the last year or so, our food costs have gone up over 25% [and] labor has gone up. That’s made it kind of a struggle, and people get upset when you raise the price of a hamburger [and] it upsets me too,” he said.

Aside from nationwide inflation, Pullman is feeling the effects of a decrease in sales tax dollars, Dymkoski said.

“Those sales tax dollars support fire, police, etcetera, and when those sales tax dollars are no longer there or the people that live in our community work somewhere else or shop somewhere else, they are taking those sales tax dollars out of our community,” she said. “We’re going to feel it across the board, and for the city [it] will be difficult to recapture those sales tax dollars that we’re losing.”

Local decreases in childcare availability, increases in property taxes and other local issues are likely making it harder for business owners and employees as well, Dymkoski said.

“We’re starting a Boys and Girls Club in Pullman, which will help with that after-school programming that is now missing with the YMCA,” she said. “These all have to work together, housing, childcare, healthcare, all these things have to work together.”

Wagoner is also concered about the ongoing downtown constrution, which makes things difficult for local businesses in the area.

“With all the construction downtown, I feel bad, I mean I know most of those people and it’s just horrible what they’re going through,” he said.

Dymkoski points to this as well, and said that the project, in conjunction with the rising prices and decrease in students, makes things harder for local businesses.

Regardless of any and all difficulties, the Wagoners remain optimistic as they and their businesses enter new chapters, he said.

“It’s been a good year for us at both businesses, and it’s been fun. You have your challenges, but the good always outweighs the bad, and honestly, we’re going to miss it. Everything changes, even if you don’t want it to change,” he said. “We’re up for a change.”

As Pullman goes through these changes, it is always possible for it to bounce back, Dymkoski said.

“Pullman’s not going to be a ghost town, we just need to work hard and work together to fix all these other things that I mentioned,” she said. “It’s time for our community to really look at what they want Pullman to look like in five, 10 and 20 years, and support what that looks like.”