IMAGINE YOUR HOMEBUYER WANTS TO START A BUSINESS making and selling custom pet supplies and asks you to find a property.

WHERE DO YOU START?

A good place to begin would be to check the local zoning code to see where the business would be allowed to locate.

Originally designed by local governments to separate noisy, congested factories from tranquil neighborhoods, zoning narrowly defines each use and locates it in a specific area.

"These businesses have more flexibility to make and sell their products at the same location, while still having restrictions on their size, limiting the noise or other emissions they generate, and ensuring that they are good neighbors."

Your client’s specialized pet supply business could be in a different zone depending on whether it is being offered as a stand-alone manufacturer, as part of a retail pet store, as a pet boarding business or as a veterinary clinic.

The requirement of different zones for different uses requires everyone to become a commuter as they travel from one zone to another, from home to job, or for running errands or dropping kids off at school. It also bucks the current trend of homeowners wanting to work, live and play in the same neighborhood.

Traditionally, manufacturing was zoned out of most residential and commercial areas. However, with the emergence of a more entrepreneurial economy and small-scale production, many Northern Virginia jurisdictions have taken aggressive steps to encourage smaller businesses and craft producers to open and grow locally in both new and repurposed buildings.

Shifts in production now make small-scale operations an efficient use of older, often abandoned commercial buildings. These producers tend to focus on high quality, specialized products and services that appeal directly to local customers. Acting as both producers and retailers, their dual role makes their businesses a good fit for mixed-use areas.

“The old models of large, obnoxious manufacturing sites have largely passed into history, being replaced by small handmade craft manufacturing,” according to information provided by Douglas Loescher, in the Fairfax County’s Community Revitalization program.

These businesses have more flexibility to make and sell their products at the same location, while still having restrictions on their size, limiting the noise or other emissions they generate, and ensuring that they are good neighbors. Changing regulations may include requirements to allow community involvement with tours and classes.

According to recent census bureau data, two-thirds of manufacturers in Virginia employ no more than 20 workers – with a strong reliance on women, minorities and recent immigrants, explained Matthew Wagner, PhD, vice president of revitalization programs for the National Main Street Center, Inc. at a recent program hosted by Arlington County.

“They employ friends and neighbors and generate sales, meals and business taxes,” Falls Church Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Sally Cole pointed out – writing more broadly of community- based small businesses in a recent edition of the Falls Church News- Press. That also helps to explain why so much congressional attention focused on small businesses in the recent legislation to help resolve the economic crisis resulting from the coronavirus pandemic.

Because they are small custom producers, these small businesses frequently are able to respond more quickly to changes in local demand. A good example was the Falls Church Distillers diverting part of their liquor production to making their own brand of alcohol-based hand sanitizer when a critical shortage developed during the early stages of the crisis.

Their first batch of 300 gallons was gone within five hours of its release on Friday, March 20, as customers lined up outside the distillery with their own makeshift containers, owner Michael Paluzzi explained to Ashley Hopko, writing for the Tysons Reporter. The sanitizer may have created a new product line for the business as Paluzzi plans to expand the production to 1,000 gallons a week, which have already been preordered by area hospitals, community organizations and first responders.

He also has expanded into a vacant 1,500 square-foot space next door to fill and store the bottles and is looking to hire more workers. “I’m trying to give first priority to locals who have recently been laid off, because we are a kinship,” he explained.

In 2017, Fairfax County launched a major initiative to modernize its zoning ordinance that was first established over 40 years ago. Dubbed “zMOD,” the effort will help the county carry out its strategic plan to grow and diversify its economy.

“We want to be sure that our ordinance is forward thinking in terms of being able to accommodate uses that we don’t know about today that will be here in the future,” said Barbara Byron, director of the Fairfax County Department of Planning and Development. 

Realtors® and other interested parties are encouraged to contact Fairfax County to comment on its proposals to streamline the approval process and better address affordability for homeowners and small businesses. Learn more at fairfaxcounty.gov/ planning-development/zmod.



Frank Dillow is a past chair of NVAR’s Realtor® Commercial Council, an NVAR instructor, and a senior commercial broker in Long & Foster‘s Commercial Division. He can be reached at francis.dillow@ longandfoster.com.