Page 30 - BusinessWest December 12, 2022

Dishing Out Something Different Teri Skinner Serves Up Eclectic Menu, Atmosphere at Nosh
By Joseph Bednar
Growing up in Monson, with a father who worked in auto-body services, a young Teri Skinner occasionally visited down- town Springfield with her mother to pick up parts or paint, and they’d make time to stop by Johnson’s Bookstore and other bustling shops.
“I remember loving downtown Springfield,” she said. “Coming from a small town like Mon- son, there were so many things to do here.”
In the early days of running her restaurant, Nosh, in the Shops at Marketplace — just a few steps from the former Johnson’s site — she recalls the streets downtown being much quieter than they were in her childhood.
Then, a few years ago, she noticed a change.
“It didn’t happen overnight, but leaving here,
I started thinking, ‘wow, there are people down- town, just walking around.’ And it wasn’t just MGM, which is great asset, but a lot of communi- ty people who wanted to see Springfield become viable. And I just enjoy being down here — I love everything about it.”
Nosh, which just celebrated its sixth anniver- sary on Black Friday, wasn’t something Skinner planned to operate long-term when she started selling breads and pastries at Marketplace during the summer of 2016.
At the time, she was running a small catering
operation out of her home, following a stint at a catering company in Worces- ter that had burned her out with 70- to 80-hour work weeks.
The owners of Simply Serendip-
ity, a clothing boutique at the Shops, approached Skinner about selling her baked goods at a farmers market on Market Street, the alley that runs behind Main Street between Harrison Avenue and Bruce Landon Way.
“As the summer progressed, people were saying there’s not enough places
to eat downtown, so I started bringing sandwiches and salads. Then, as the weather cooled off, I was bringing soups. It was basically a pop-up restaurant every week, with a little table and a tent out- side. The BID provided us with small café tables, so people could actually sit out here and eat, which was nice because it’s such a cool space back here.”
She thought that would be the end of
that enterprise, but as the cool weather approached, a small space opened up in
the Shops, and one of the property own-
ers approached Skinner about it. “She opened up this door, and it was a closet. But what caught my eye was this big wall, and I could picture a menu
Staff Photo
Nosh’s colorful menu boards offer plenty of options for vegans, vegetarians, and carnivores alike.
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