Saint John Market Square sees influx of new businesses

Market Square in Saint John, N.B., has welcomed two new businesses in as many months.

Market Square in Uptown Saint John, N.B., has welcomed several new tenants recently, transforming vacant storefronts into bustling businesses.

The latest new tenant is Hats on the Square, which relocated from Germain Street to a space that was once a hotbed of activity along the waterfront.

“Everybody is starting to fill up and be alive and happy again,” says owner Susie Hines. “I’ve been actually receiving a lot of notices from people saying that they remember back in the day when it was really alive and filled and wishing me all the best.”

Hines says the move inside the Square has a number of benefits, including access for those using wheelchairs or scooters, and 24/7 security.

The other Market Square tenants have welcomed Hines with open arms, she says, and she looks forward to growing those relationships.

“What I’m finding here is we all complement one another,” Hines says. “You get a purse, you get a hat, you get a new jacket, you get a hat. We’re all complementing each other and that’s really, really nice.”

Hines is the second tenant to move into Market Square in as many months. In March, the Write Cup Bookstore Café inked its place in the latest chapter for the Square.

In the past year a number of new tenants have moved into the space, including EmBreeze. The business has already signed on for another year, not wanting to lose their spot in Market Square’s revival.

“It’s great because it helps everyone,” says EmBreeze partner April DeWolfe when asked about the new tenants. “If I’m helping him and he’s helping me, we’re all growing together. Everyone here is trying to help each other, so we’re trying to build up and I think we’re successfully doing it. Each month it seems better and better.”

Over the last half decade, Market Square has had its fair share of trials. First it was the pandemic, which was immediately followed up by years on construction on the new public space and restaurant patios.

With all that work now in the rear view, businesses are looking forward to a big summer.

“Just to see bright new faces, even anywhere from across the world, we’re very excited about it,” says Martin Max Technology Limited store manager Jano Rouselle. “Seeing a lot of faces, a lot of customers, and a lot of people come to the store and they’re like, ‘I haven’t been here in so long.‘”

The Saint John Ale House has weathered all of those changes in the last 20 years.

Owner Jesse Vergen, who also owns Barred Rock Chicken and Toro Toro inside the Square, says the space has always been the centre of activity for Uptown Saint John.

He says the restaurants in particular are looking forward to a summer with no patio issues, and believes now is the time for Market Square to regain its once stellar form.

“People are excited to come down back to the boardwalk,” Vergen says. “Stakeholders that have always been involved in the uptown for, not necessarily just down here on the boardwalk, are working together with other business owners, other stakeholders and are just trying to create culture, excitement, and entertainment here in the uptown.

“It was very difficult to get through those years of the vacancies in here. Not being able to walk in the front door, and even having doors closed down, the pedway system being shut down but now it’s all opened up and people are seeing the value to come here and rent and bring their businesses.”

The New Brunswick Museum left a glaring vacancy when it departed the Square in 2022. Plans were in place for a new French international school to move into the space, before the institution pulled out of the deal in early 2024.

Market Square first opened in 1983 and was part of an uptown renaissance in Saint John which began in the 1970s.

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