Our Local Economy

Gardiner’s Downtown is a service center for 27,000 people in 5-mile radius and 71,000 in immediate area

The market is a vibrant mix of retail, services, eating establishments, and housing.

Our plans call for major improvements in arts, culture, waterfront recreation, tourism, and conference opportunities in the Downtown. It also calls for the addition of new retail, service, and restaurant opportunities in very specific markets (see below) to support the vision of Downtown Gardiner as the place "where originality matters".


Statistics
• A major part of Maine’s 2nd largest retail and labor market
• Service center for 27,000 people in 5 mile radius, and 71,000 in immediate area
• Over 30,000 cars travel through Downtown Gardiner each day
• Close proximity to I-95 and the Maine Turnpike
• $45,000,000 of retail sales in 2001, with untapped potential for growth

Cold. Hard. Cash.
The ice industry began in the Gardiner area in 1826 when the brig, Orion, took a cargo of ice to Baltimore and sold it for $700. In winter, the frozen Kennebec was sawed into blocks of ice (a.k.a. FROZEN GOLD), and sawdust from the numerous sawmills that lined the Cobbossee was used to pack the ice. By the end of the century, an ice industry had been created that added $2,000,000 a year to the local economy. Talk about Yankee ingenuity!