There are a lot of reasons Minneapolis residents aren’t visiting their favorite local businesses right now. The collective focus is diverted to taking care of neighbors, checking Signal for the latest mutual aid ask, or drawing the blinds and staying at home until it feels safe to come out again.
Going out to eat, shopping for a cute knick knack, or even grabbing that routine morning latte just doesn’t feel like a priority right now.
“This is not a unique situation to one business. This is something that many of our neighbors are navigating right now,” Marlene Leiva, new owner of French Meadow Bakery on Lyndale Avenue, said to a crowd gathered at the restaurant’s Nord Social Hall on Feb. 7, 2026.
Leiva herself is an immigrant who came to the U.S. 26 years ago.
“I have seen first hand how quickly disruption impacts employees, vendors, operations, even the ability to plan for the future,” Levia said.
French Meadow Bakery co-hosted The Community Call fundraiser with Uptown Association to keep local businesses’ doors open, Leiva said.
Uptown Association FUNDRAISER
The fundraiser simultaneously raised funds for French Meadow Bakery and a small business fund operated by Uptown Association. The goal is to provide rapid financial assistance to businesses within two to three months.
The Uptown Association will be forming a committee to distribute the funds.
“A lot of the bigger foundations are getting a lot of money right now from bigger corporations. But there’s a lot of red tape involved with that,” Corbin said. “Businesses need it now.”
Uptown Association did not announce the amount of the money it raised by publication time.
Minneapolis Foundation $4 MILLION POOL
Minneapolis Foundation’s Economic Response Fund is a $4 million pool of money from 35 Minnesota-based corporations and individual donors including General Mills, Best Buy, and Target that will be made available to small businesses to support payroll, help with rent, maintain inventory, and other needs.
The money will be handled by community organizations including Lake Street Council, Latino Economic Development Center, and the West Bank Business Association.
Businesses with a maximum of 40 employees can now apply for grants ranging from $2,000 to $10,000. Grants will be accepted until all funds have been exhausted.
“This fund is a great start for the business community to help mobilize resources to support the lives and livelihoods of our neighbors,” President and CEO of the Minneapolis Foundation R.T. Rybak said in a press release.
The Salt Cure Restaurant Fund was announced on Feb. 12, a Minneapolis Foundation fund with a specific goal of funding restaurants in Minnesota.
“Industry leaders in Minnesota consider this to be a COVID-level crisis, as restaurant revenues in January fell as much as 50 percent compared to a typical January,” a press release from the Salt Cure fund reads.
January is already one of the slowest months for the restaurant industry.
A nationwide day of giving was scheduled for Feb. 18 where restaurants and bars across the country could donate a portion of the day’s profits or ask their guests to donate directly to the Salt Cure fund.
Meet Minneapolis: MPLS FOR MPLS
No matter where you go in Minneapolis, businesses are not operating as usual. Storefronts are operating as makeshift donation collection sites. Some businesses are choosing to lock their doors, others have keys dangling on the inside in case federal agents attempt to enter.
Meet Minneapolis, a tourism organization based in downtown Minneapolis, launched the MPLS for MPLS campaign that explained what visitors may experience when supporting a local business, including limited staff and changing hours.
Meet Minneapolis’ Senior Vice President of Destination Branding and Strategy, Courtney Ries, said it was important to be transparent with people about what they could expect visiting particular businesses.
“It’s been a really unique time to help convey to the world how challenged our community is feeling, while also letting the world know that we are open for business,” Ries said. “We are a functioning city.”
The MPLS for MPLS webpage plainly states that business “hours can change on short notice” and “many places are family-run, and kindness, flexibility, and appreciation really matter.”
Ries said that giving people information about what to expect at local businesses “empowers people” and removes a barrier to entry that is similar to what happened during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Meet Minneapolis created a toolkit for people to use on their social media and websites and are encouraging people to use the hashtag #MPLSforMPLS online when sharing “love stories to Minneapolis.”
The campaign highlights small businesses including La Mama, Saturday Dumpling Co, Cocina Latina, and Eat Street Crossing, and local community events.
The organization also created a Go. Give. Gift. for Minneapolis campaign, where people are encouraged to buy gift cards from a long list of Minneapolis businesses on its website.
“Minneapolis was, quite frankly, getting pretty tapped out. So we said, ‘How can we have the Metro community, who obviously are feeling affects as well, help to support us?’” Ries said.
As the hospitality industry navigates an announced end to Operation Metro Surge, Ries compared it to peeking one’s head out after a storm.
“What’s the destruction that’s been left in the wake of this tornado or this hurricane? Where we are right now is taking stock of what’s the real deal on the ground,” Ries said. “We know that a lot of these businesses, they’re behind.”
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