PREPARING FOR LAUNCH
HOW DOWNTOWN'S OLD PROBLEMS LED TO A NEW VISION FOR ITS FUTURE
Fourteen months ago, Delaney Armenti held a pop-up shop in Downtown Lynchburg, selling dozens of pairs of shoes from her collection that she had accumulated over the years. At the time, Armenti stored her collection across multiple rooms in her home and was selling them out of the trunk of her car. For her, sneaker collecting was just a hobby that helped her express herself and pay the bills; she never imagined the business would blossom into a full-fledged brick-and-mortar location.
Just a few years before her first pop-up in downtown, Armenti sold her entire sneaker collection to buy a new laptop for college. The Lynchburg native was attending Sweet Briar College at the time, studying performing arts, and playing for the women’s soccer team. Upon graduating from college in 2024, Armenti began to take sneaker reselling more seriously, attending shoe conventions across the country to build up her inventory.
It wasn’t until she met Tia Hancock, the owner of P.R.E.A.M., a local houseplant care and service business, that Armenti felt inspired to turn her hobby into a career. Hancock was one of the first business owners to invite her to hold a pop-up shop for her business.
“Sometimes just having someone believe in you can go a long way,” said Armenti, who says Hancock was a mentor to her and encouraged her to pursue opening a physical store for her business after seeing the event’s success.
Now, a year removed from her pop-up at P.R.E.A.M., Armenti owns and operates Laneykickz, a local sneaker shop that buys and sells new and used sneakers at affordable prices.
“All this has been such a great blur,” said Armenti, 24, who opened Laneykickz in October and has already tripled her inventory since. “It just feels like a movement more than a sneaker store.”
A New Vision for Downtown
The opening of small businesses such as Armenti’s is part of Lynchburg’s growing effort to revitalize downtown, which is laid out in the Downtown 2040 Master Plan that the city council adopted in November 2018, which states:
In 2040, Downtown Lynchburg will be a bustling and thriving urban core; the economic, social, and cultural hub of Central Virginia - a destination for visitors and a livable neighborhood for residents...This is the exciting atmosphere that makes Downtown Lynchburg the heart of the region.
At the time that the city council was set to vote on the adoption of the Downtown 2040 Master Plan, former chair of the Downtown Lynchburg Association (DLA), Brandon Farmer, said that the city had the full support of the DLA and urged the city to partner with the organization to help revitalize downtown.
“Please reach out, we want to participate in the implementation of this plan,” Farmer told city council members at a meeting held on Oct. 9, 2018.
Since the city council approved the plan in November 2018, the DLA, formerly known as Lynch’s Landing, has worked to advance this vision for downtown’s revitalization by hosting community events, promoting local businesses, and implementing business development programs.
In late 2022, the DLA announced the first year of Launch LYH, a program focused on bringing new and existing businesses to downtown. Since its inaugural year in 2023, Launch LYH has helped open 15 businesses and awarded $290,000 in grant funds to support small businesses.
An Investment in the Community
Earlier this year, Armenti was one of five Launch LYH winners who received $20,000 to help kickstart their business. With the grant money, Armenti redesigned her space, located at 1107 Main St., to create a unique shopping experience for customers.
“I had to give people a reason why they should shop with me,” Armenti said. “Being a Lynchburg native and understanding your community, you’re able to insert the business in a way that actually helps people.”
Armenti credits her experience with Launch LYH with equipping her with the tools and knowledge to open her business, saying the resources provided were invaluable.
“I needed the knowledge; I needed the mentorship,” Armenti says. “When you do it by yourself, you don’t really get that.”
Other Launch LYH participants have echoed Armenti’s remarks, saying that the program helped them consider aspects of their business that they had not given much thought to prior.
Lynne Forth, who was also a Launch LYH winner in 2025, says the classes were an eye-opener for her and gave her the tools she needed to launch her new business, Needle Ninja, which will open in Spring 2026 and sell sewing-related products and provide sewing lessons for the public.
“Without taking the courses, I don’t think I ever would have actually opened my business,” said Forth, who learned about the program from a friend and was encouraged to apply. “I think I would have talked about it for years and just never had the courage to do it.”
How Launch LYH is Structured
When the DLA first announced the Launch LYH program in late 2022, multiple longstanding downtown businesses had just closed, including the Lynchburg Camera Shop, which had been a downtown staple for over 80 years, and Speakertree, a vinyl record shop that had operated for over a decade. According to the DLA’s 2023-2025 Strategic Plan, downtown’s vacancy rate at the time sat at 25 percent, and the area lacked entertainment options and key amenities such as grocery stores and pharmacies.
To address this problem, the DLA applied for and was awarded a Community Business Launch (CBL) grant, which, according to the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD), is a “place-based entrepreneurial development strategy that fills a critical mass of vacant storefronts with expansion or start-up ventures.” Before they were able to receive the grant funds to distribute to entrepreneurs, the DLA had to provide small business education classes to participants.
The guidelines for the CBL state that the courses must cover the following components:
- Legal structure
- Marketing (including website and social media development), Sales, and Advertising
- Operations (Human resources/hiring, inventory management and distribution, and logistics)
- State and Local Compliance (licensing, permitting, health code requirements, insurance, etc.)
- Financial Planning & Management (including bookkeeping, profit & loss statements, breakeven analysis, business taxes, and other resources for financing a business)
To provide Launch LYH participants with these free business education classes, the DLA partnered with the Lynchburg Small Business Development Center (SBDC).
Stephanie Keener, the executive director of the SBDC, says the partnership was a “natural fit” and aligned with the organization’s commitment to helping small businesses flourish across Lynchburg.
“It’s really stressful to start a business, and we want to help people smooth that out a little bit,” said Keener, who added that by helping small businesses succeed, they in turn can bring strong economic growth to the area.
“One of the biggest things that helps with vibrancy in a downtown district is making sure that we don’t have empty storefronts,” Keener noted. “If you have an empty storefront in downtown, it’s not generating economic impact on the community.”
The Launch LYH program began with an application process in which applicants were asked to describe their business idea in detail. Across all three iterations of Launch LYH, over 100 entrepreneurs submitted applications to be a part of the program each year. After DLA staff reviewed the applications, around 25 applicants received invitations to attend the eight-week business development course. Applicants who participated in the classes were divided into two tracks: startup businesses and existing businesses. In these classes, instructors from the DLA, the SBDC, and other local entities helped applicants construct their business plans, teaching them entrepreneurial skills from marketing to financial planning.
The eight-week course ends with a pitch presentation, where applicants lay out their business plan and answer any questions the program judges might have about the business. From there, the judges vote on and select five finalists to receive the grant funds.
Forth described her selection as a Launch LYH finalist as a “crazy feeling” and is grateful to be a part of the revitalization of Downtown Lynchburg.
“I feel like Downtown Lynchburg, more than ever, is attracting people from even outside of Lynchburg,” says Forth, who has lived in the Hill City for nearly two decades. “It’s amazing, honestly, that I get to be a part of that.”
As more small businesses open in downtown thanks to Launch LYH, their long-term impact on the city remains unknown. Since the first-year grant recipients were announced in 2023, 14 businesses have officially opened to the public, with one company, Needle Ninja, slated to open in May 2026. As of December 2025, two Launch LYH businesses have closed their physical locations, and one is temporarily closed, citing economic and personal reasons.
At the heart of downtown’s revitalization are the small business owners like Armenti and Forth. They have occupied vacant storefronts that sat empty for years, and their impact on Lynchburg extends beyond financial growth. Despite receiving a $20,000 grant, many economic and personal sacrifices are needed to create a solid foundation for the business to thrive on. They have achieved their dream of becoming business owners, but even that comes at a price.
UP NEXT
PART TWO
THE COST OF A DREAM
FROM POTTERY TO PIZZA, MEET THE SMALL BUSINESS OWNERS WHO SACRIFICED COMFORT TO CHASE THEIR DREAMS
How We Reported This Story
Jacob Clavijo met with 12 business owners across Downtown Lynchburg, including 10 Launch LYH winners, to discuss their experiences as small-business owners in the city. He also spoke with multiple people involved in coordinating Launch LYH, including members of the Virginia Small Business Development Center and the Downtown Lynchburg Association.
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