Lexi Saldana
Daily Herald
The Uplift Thrift is a store with a mission as owners Josh Stringer and Janessa Dueck aim to revitalize the city’s downtown through affordable pricing, community clothing drives, and a goal to start an event space.
The pair first started a buy-and-sell business, buying items and selling them on Facebook marketplace. But after an eye-opening experience during the cold winter season, Stringer was compelled to create something to give back to the community.
“When we went to go do a delivery, it was actually in a place where there weren’t any homes. It was a homeless person,” said Stringer. “We kind of seen the whole human aspect of it. We just want to start something where we can give back.”
Gloria Sanderson, owner of Dwight’s Coffeehouse in downtown Prince Albert, believes a few factors are the causes of scarce foot traffic in the area, particularly parking.
“The parking is horrible, and as for anything else, I think it could be more lively,” said Sanderson.“Parking is the biggest factor. I mean, they have a 10-minute loading zone, but when everybody’s getting tickets left and right, they don’t want to come over here.”
According to the City of Prince Albert’s website, urban city cores like Central Avenue were initially designed as one-way streets, made to move traffic quickly. But this way of urban planning encouraged speeding, limited access to shops and services, and deterred visitors from exploring the area. However, in May of 2026, the Prince Albert City Council approved a new design for the Downtown Rebuild project, with a motion to create two-way traffic on Central Avenue near River Street, a public plaza near city hall, and updated street amenities such as street lamps, trees, and street furniture.
Additionally, the City of Prince Albert’s Strategic Plan for 2026 to 2029 included initiatives like reestablishing the core as a commercial-friendly, walkable, and liveable community, investments on river fronts and streetscapes, growing downtown tourism, evaluating vacant spaces, launching a downtown business retention and expansion program, involving local feedback, and facilitating arts and culture programs in order to ‘build a robust economy’.
Although Sanderson has not yet seen improvements to foot traffic in her first year of business, she believes local establishments like Uplift Thrift are essential for downtown culture, stating that “they keep it alive,” and “they keep it interesting.”
Stringer has the same idea, confirmed through his choice of location for the store.
“Our goal was that we wanted to bring some life back into this area that really was not being utilized for a long time,” he said. “We’ve seen this area, it was all boarded up and we wanted to revitalize it, bring back some life to it.”
The Uplift Thrift opened its doors Saturday, inviting the public for free donuts, a Summer Free Ride contest, and a first-look at their assortment of products including clothes, home decor, furniture, books, as well as donated goods from the Food For a Smile community barbecue event.
“Everybody can use the things we sell in the store,” said Stringer. “We try to sell them at an affordable price where everybody can really afford them.”
Alongside prioritizing affordability, Stringer also hopes to collaborate with other local businesses to host events that advocate and help the community.
“We also started a non-profit group called Uplift Community Event Center where we are actually raising money right now to either purchase or rent a space where we can provide programs for mental health awareness, drug addiction awareness, literacy programs for children, and live music events,” he said.
The Uplift Thrift’s grand opening was received positively from attendees and residents, with supportive comments left by locals on the store’s Facebook page.
“The community is great. They’ve all been positive towards us,” said Stringer. “They’ve been bringing in donations to us which helps us keep our stores stocked and they’ve shown us it’s possible in this area.”
