Christie Johnson and Max Miller run Ignite, a business incubator out of Washington & Jefferson College, and their approach is worth understanding—especially if you're thinking about what actually fills empty storefronts long-term.
Ignite runs the Ideas 2 Enterprise program, which takes people with concepts and walks them through the actual mechanics of starting a business. Five weeks. Market research, financial modeling, pitch tactics, business plan development, and 5-year financial projections. You finish that track, your best three ideas get grant money—five thousand for first place, three thousand for second, one thousand for third. Then subsidized co-working for three months, a digital strategy session, and a CliftonStrengths assessment so you understand how your actual capabilities match what you're trying to build.
That's the structure. The substance is why it matters.
Why This Model Works
When you're trying to fill a storefront on McKean Avenue in Charleroi, you don't want tenants who are guessing. You want people who have done basic market work, who understand their finances, who know what they need to succeed. Ignite produces exactly that kind of founder. Scoop Dog Canine Creamery came through the program. Kindred Flower Farm came through. These aren't concepts that failed—they're in the world and operational because the founders understood what they were doing from the start.
For a real estate operator, that's the signal that actually matters. A co-working space is useful for overhead. Networking is useful for connections. But the program that actually converts someone from having an idea to being a functioning business owner—that's the foundation of a neighborhood economy that doesn't depend on chains or chains of subsidies.
"Empty storefronts get filled by tenants who are educated, prepared, and structurally supported. Ignite creates exactly that."
The Infrastructure for Long-Term Viability
Co-working space in Washington, PA gives people the operational base to start without the full commitment of a lease. The 5-year financial projections mean they're thinking beyond the first year. The pitch training means they're not just pitching to investors—they're building the habit of communicating what they do in a way that actually works. The CliftonStrengths assessment is specific but matters: self-knowledge about what you're actually good at changes the decisions you make about delegation and growth.
This is the difference between an incubator that teaches business theory and one that produces people capable of running actual businesses. Ignite does the second thing. If you're investing in a market, that's what you want to see: organizations that are structured to produce founders who last.