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Updated: Dec 14, 2021



Gene Smith and Matt Gebhardt are partners at Grim Digital Media. They design and build websites, produce videos and do photography. They started a Flower City Collective that includes other creative professionals that share space with them and they also have two large studios for themselves and creative professionals to rent. Matt says that they’ve kind of evolved into a production house which started in the beginning of 2020 when they moved into the six thousand square foot space that is in the Neighborhood of the Arts. Before that, they worked in a small space in the Park Ave. area. That’s where they started Grim Digital Media in 2015.


Gene and Matt graduated from Spencerport High School in 1991. Gene enjoyed his experience when he was class president and Matt just enjoyed high school in general, playing soccer and hanging out with great friends. Gene lived just outside of Parma in Greece, but always went to the Spencerport schools. “I spent countless days in and around the village of Spencerport,” Gene said. He remembers making terrible movies with friends, but it was something fun to do. He also took photographs during Culture Days. “Culture Day was a day where my friends and I would find a place that we had never been, go there and explore that place. I would take photographs of the experience,” Gene said. “You could say that is when I found my passion for photography and film making.”


Matt has fond memories of growing up in Spencerport too. “No internet, social media, school shootings or pandemics…it felt like a completely safe environment to be a kid,” Matt said. He remembers shopping with his family at Bells when he was little, which is now Tops, and also shopping at Ben Franklin for matchbox cars. Ben Franklin was where the Dollar Tree is now. Although Gene and Matt no longer live in Spencerport, they still like to visit. Gene likes going to the Texas BBQ to have a cowboy baked potatoe and Matt loves going to the Brindle Haus. Matt’s Mom still lives in Spencerport, so he makes it out to the village to see her every now and then.




Clutch on the Canal opened in Spencerport at the end of September. They have another location in Greece. Now Art Affliction Tattoo has moved into Spencerport from their Greece location. They have yet to renovate the space in the heart of the village on Union Street, but they put their name on the window at the end of October. It’s exciting for Spencerport to see how quickly a new tenant has moved into the Masonic Temple building. Before Affliction Tattoo, it was Bare Salon Spa, which closed the first week of October, so it only took three weeks to fill the space with Art Affliction Tattoo.


The space right near Art Affliction Tattoo has not been so lucky. This space has been empty since January of 2020. It used to be Bauer’s Boutique, but they moved three spaces down to a smaller location and now they are moving again! Bauer’s Boutique is moving to Gates on November 26th which means there will be two spaces available to rent in the Masonic Temple building.


Another business that is moving to a new location is Bob’s Pool and Garden. While Bauer’s Boutique decided to move out of Spencerport, Bob’s Pool and Garden is staying nearby where they built a new building on the corner of Gillette Rd. and Route 31. Back on Union Street, there’s a good chance that Brindle Haus expands their brewery into the space that is occupied by Bob’s Pool and Garden.


There’s another space that’s being renovated at Parma Place on Ridge Road. American Computer Services is moving into this plaza and they will be fixing everything like video games and phones and computers. Yoga With Integrity moved into Spencer’s Landing in October and they now have classes in their studio on the second floor above Hunt Real Estate. Next to Spencer’s Landing at Mccolley’s, the restaurant added a room with more than thirty seats.


Overall, there continues to be a lot going on in this suburb of Rochester. There’s brand new businesses renovating spaces around Spencerport, there’s old businesses moving to new locations, and a new business that is up and running. The construction at 148 South Union Street next to Grandpa Sam’s is coming along too. They are currently working on the basement.

Writer's pictureDan Bauman

Updated: Jan 11, 2022


In the early Spring of 2021, a Spencerport company, Loyal Nine Development, put a fence around the property at the corner of Union Street and the North entrance of Tops Plaza. Loyal Nine Development was assisting Fallone Properties, who is the company that is building a three story building on this corner. There is going to be retail on the first floor and apartments on the second and third floor. The tallest buildings in Spencerport are three stories high. This is the most significant project since building a Rite Aid (Walgreens) on Route 31 almost four years ago.


Fallone Properties has been around for over fifty years. Most of their experience is with building custom houses throughout Monroe County. In mid-August, Fallone Properties started to dig a basement for the upcoming building, but they discovered that the south wall of the building (Grandpa Sam’s) next to the corner property needs to be reinforced. Work resumed in the first week of October.


Spencerport, Ogden, and Parma are alive and well with over eighty businesses and only a small number of vacant buildings. In 2021, there have been nine new businesses that started in and around Spencerport. For instance, a half a block up the street from the corner construction, on the east side near the Union Street bridge, a new business opened up in September called Clutch On The Canal. Clutch is an upscale sports bar whose owners grew up in Spencerport. There is another Clutch in Greece which has been there since 2016. Also on this block next to Clutch On The Canal, two beauty salons that do eyelashes and other things popped up this year. The Lash Lounge opened up in February and Iris Sage Aesthetics opened up in September.

Near the corner of Union Street and Ridge Road, a new building was constructed next to the Dollar General. Riccardi Italian Deli opened up in this building in June. There was a ribbon cutting in late September. The president of the Spencerport Chamber of Commerce, the Assemblyman of Parma, the Parma town supervisor, and the owner of Riccardi Italian Deli all spoke at this event.


Like Clutch, another franchise is occurring at the top of the hill on Union Street in Spencerport. The space next to Spencerport Hots was renovated to become the drip house. Drip house is a sweat lodge and they opened in October. They have three locations: Spencerport, Pittsford and Williamsville. In the same plaza, Virtue Salon, which is a beauty shop that does hair, opened in February. This makes three beauty shops that opened up in Spencerport in 2021.


The grand opening of Your CBD Store was in mid-July. This is a nationwide company that is located on Union Street next to Tim Horton’s. Also in July, Xtreme Discount Goods opened up in the Village Square building on West Ave. On the second floor, directly above Xtreme Discount Goods, American Elder Care in association with BrainWorks ROC opened early in the year. There are more spaces available in Village Square. Overall, there has been tremendous growth in Spencerport, Ogden and Parma.


The community is also getting bigger with new housing. Sandalwood Estates is a housing track that was started in 2018. It is located on Union Street near the Plantation Party House. There are twenty-four lots in this housing track and there are currently eleven houses that are built and being built and all of them are sold. The current builder is Lopresti Homes, which is located in Spencerport, New York. The owner of Lopresti Homes graduated from Spencerport High School.

 

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