This year’s special addition to Vote 4 The Best, Editors Pick, was made to highlight businesses who have gone above and beyond for their community, their customers, and in adjusting to this year’s circumstances. Read more about Editors Pick HERE.
After opening right before the pandemic and finding new ways to execute their unique vision, Bea’s Detroit is the Editors Pick for Best Business Innovator!
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“The idea of Bea’s was actually born out of necessity,” Owner and CEO Beatrice Wolnerman said. “I was running a business out of my own home, and faced a dilemma that many growing businesses face: too large for a home, but not yet ready for a dedicated facility. Other working spaces were too small, so we decided to create Bea’s as not only a place for our business to operate, but others as well.”
Bea’s has three main components. Starting on the first floor is their warehouse, where small businesses can manufacture their goods on-site. The second floor offers a headquarters for businesses with private offices and conference rooms available. The final component of Bea’s is a café, but with quite the twist.
“The café has retail space for our members to sell the goods they’ve made here,” Wolnerman said. “Being able to create and sell your product in the same place provides a true full-circle experience.”
The large space at Bea’s normally turns into a place for private events, but with COVID-19 sweeping the world, many people have put their celebrations on hold. In order to replicate the Bea’s experience during the pandemic, Wolnerman launched a virtual community called “BeaHive.”
“It allowed us to give our members the same benefits they’d get in person at Bea’s,” Wolnerman said. “Before we were allowed to open back up, we used BeaHive to network our members with other businesses and even organized an Art Garden on the Dequindre Cut that was a great success for us all summer.”
BeaHive was an incredibly innovative way to not only keep their own business afloat during the pandemic, but also many other local small businesses! The platform provided live, daily content along with the networking opportunities, allowing them all to “not just survive, but thrive.”
Bea’s Detroit has built a one-stop-shop for customers, while also providing a boost to local businesses.
“When you buy something at Bea’s, 100% of that money is going back into one of our small businesses," Wolnerman said. “We like to say we’re the ‘Place to Bea’ because we truly believe we have something to offer to anyone who walks through our doors, whether you’re a customer or business owner.”
For more favorites of every type of business you can think of, chosen by locals like you, check out the winners of our main Vote 4 The Best contest!
Our Sponsor -- We’d like to thank Wallside Windows for their longtime sponsorship of Vote 4 the Best and their support of southeast Michigan’s local businesses. Wallside is a Taylor, MI-based family business that manufactures and installs custom replacement windows, now in their third generation.