Parklet Firm Discovers No Such Thing As Bad Publicity After Tabloid ‘Hatchet Job’ Boosts Business

A London firm that makes “parklet” sidewalk extensions was on the receiving end of what it claims was a “hatchet job” by a British tabloid newspaper. However, far from denting sales, the mockery by the Daily Mail boosted Meristem Design’s profile, and the business could soon be selling many more of its wooden parking-bay replacements.

“The hatchet job on our Parklets spectacularly backfired as we’ve been inundated with requests for them across the U.K. since the article,” said the company’s October 22 tweet, which has since gone viral.

Headlined “The death of driving…by 1,000 cuts,” the Daily Mail’s October 20 article claimed that it was a “war against motorists” for councils to replace parking spaces with “troublesome wooden structures.”

One motoring activist interviewed by the paper said that councils “have got blood on their hands” for installing such street furniture because “emergency vehicles [are] unable to go about their businesses properly.”

Hugh Bladon, a founder of the climate-science denying Alliance of British Drivers, told the Daily Mail that councils “hate anybody using the car or any four-wheeled vehicle.”

Sales boost

Parklets are the same dimensions as typical parking bays and usually feature seating interspersed with planters filled with greenery. The Daily Mail and some motorists may not like them, but many people do. Studies have shown that food and beverage businesses see an annual uplift in turnover of about 30% after installing a parklet.

Meristem Design was flooded with interest in its products after the Daily Mail’s mauling.

“We went from one sales inquiry a day to 20,” Meristem Design’s sales and marketing director Habib Khan told me by telephone.

While many firms have laid-off staff during the pandemic, Meristem Design has increased its payroll, with five new jobs created by growing demand.

The firm’s modular parklets, usually floored with decking planks, take the place of curbside parking spaces and can provide coffee shops and restaurants with vibrant, plant-dotted outdoor seating areas. Covid-specific parklets are separated with Perspex screens.

Pocket parks

The first parklets appeared in California fifteen years ago. “Tactical urbanists” used potted plants, benches and turf to take over individual parking bays in San Francisco. Even though activists paid for the spaces by feeding parking meters, local authorities initially clamped down on the makeovers.

However, the city took notice when bars and restaurants reported an uptick in takings whenever an impromptu parklet appeared. By 2010, San Francisco started installing city-sanctioned parklets.

There are now over 3,000 parklets in U.S. cities, and the concept has spread around the world. London has 50 parklets and many other U.K. cities have also installed them, especially since the start of the pandemic when the government recommended al fresco eating and drinking.

Cars don’t buy lunch

Donald Shoup, distinguished research professor of urban planning at the University of California at Los Angeles, has previously told me that cars are parked for 95% of their lives: inactive, in other words.

The author of the groundbreaking 2005 book The High Cost of Free Parking, stressed:

“Only a tiny percentage of a restaurant’s customers can come from the limited car parking space in front of a restaurant.”

Far better, say parklet advocates, for that restaurant to entice people to linger rather than cars.

A typical parking-bay-sized parklet costs between £5,000 and £10,000.

Khan said sales at Meristem Design have almost doubled since the start of the pandemic. And now sales could be boosted even further due to the Daily Mail’s “hatchet job,” said Khan.

“We started seeing a surge in inquiries and initially put it down to a virtual conference we attended. But then inquiries went up to about 20 a day, and people said they’d read about us in the Daily Mail. When we clicked on the article we saw pictures of our products and thought it was a straightforward plug.”

But it wasn’t; it was knocking copy.

“It was a negative article about parklets, but the [Daily Mail] included all our best pictures and even put links to our website. Our traffic went up by 300%!”

Khan said the firm had now seen inquiries from all over the U.K.

“Every time I click on my inbox, there’s another email asking about parklets, and all because of the Daily Mail’s hatchet job; we’re very grateful.”

Meristem Design’s chairman is David Firth, a non-executive director of several Alternative Investment Market (AIM) companies.

Khan said interest in the firm’s parklets was also coming from the education sector.

“Schools are now requesting parklets. Replacing one or two parking bays with a parklet provides a social space and also stops parents from parking right outside the school gates, pushing away pollution.”

While some British cities have installed a small number of individual parklets, others have transformed streets by daisy-chaining a number of them together. Meristem Designs’ largest installation to date has been a nine-bay makeover.

“When there’s less parking, it makes for a better shopping and dining experience,” said Khan. His favorite restaurant in London is on Carnaby Street, which has been pedestrianized since 1973.

“It’s really pleasant [on Carnaby Street]; a complete contrast to Oxford Street,” he said.

“The difference is that there are no cars; it’s that simple.”