Foss said she decided to open West Pecan because she noticed downtown Pflugerville had no sit-down coffee shops.
West Pecan has since become a staple of downtown Pflugerville, but Foss’ involvement in bettering downtown did not stop there.
Foss said shortly after she opened West Pecan, local vendors began asking if they could set up pop-up stores outside the coffee shop.
Together with Wink Boutique owner Brittany Parker, Foss started the Pecan Street Collective, a monthly market day where local artisans and home-based businesses could set up booths on Wink and West Pecan’s porches.
The Pecan Street Collective takes place in downtown Pflugerville from 10 a.m.-1 p.m. on the first Saturday of each month. At first, Foss said, there was only space for around five vendors, but over time several more downtown businesses such as Stylin’ Salon and Ruffles & Rust have joined to lend their space as well, and now the capacity is closer to 30.
Foss said the Pecan Street Collective is good for both vendors and downtown businesses.
“People can just walk around, hit up all the vendors, get their coffee, do some shopping, figure out that they’re going to get their hair cut at Stylin’ next time, and it generates business as well for the boutiques across the street,” Foss said.
Despite a break in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Pecan Street Collective is more popular than ever, Foss said.
As she adds more vendors to the roster and more downtown businesses choose to participate, Foss said she hopes the event will eventually span much of downtown.“We named it the Pecan Street Collective with the hope that someday it could be something that was a really big part of downtown, and that people from other towns would hear of it and choose to come,” Foss said.
Additionally, Foss became a member of the Pflugerville Chamber of Commerce board of directors in 2021 after having been involved with the chamber since opening West Pecan.
When the chamber created its downtown programs committee earlier this year, Foss was asked to chair the committee.
Because the committee is relatively new, Foss said its work has mostly focused on gaining traction.
“There’s a lot of hopefulness and vision for what [the committee] could look like,” Foss said. “The hope is just that we could all kind of work together to bring more interest and more people downtown.”
One idea Foss said she and the committee intend to pursue is the creation of an annual festival downtown that could draw people from across the area.
“We think [a festival] will really help to highlight downtown,” Foss said. “And then from there, we’ll have some traction that we can continue to put the idea of coming to downtown as a place to hang out in front of people’s minds.”
Beyond downtown efforts and her involvement in the chamber, Foss recently began a program at West Pecan in which a portion of the proceeds from the shop’s in-house-roasted coffee beans go to a different nonprofit each month.
Organizations that have benefited from the program so far include the animal rehabilitation nonprofit PAWS and the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.
“We see all the support that we’ve gotten through the pandemic, and we want to make sure and give back,” Foss said.
Pecan Street Collective
Since Mary Foss helped found the event in 2018, the number of downtown businesses participating in the Pecan Street Collective has tripled to six. The collective hosts a total of 25-plus booths from local creators and home-based businesses. The event often features live music. 10 a.m.-1 p.m., First Saturday of each month
Ceramics N More
101 W. Pecan St., Ste. B
512-906-0207
Ruffles & Rust
101 W. Pecan St.
512-252-9300
Stylin’ Salon & Spa
201 W. Main St., Ste. 101
512-251-0054
United Partners Pflugerville
102 S. Third St.
West Pecan Coffee + Beer
100 W. Pecan St.
512-551-3471
Wink Boutique
403 W. Pecan St.
512-990-0008
