Pop-Up Winona

Community ServicesVerified

About

Pop-Up Winona is a community-activated lot and micro-entrepreneur incubator at 4951 El Cajon Boulevard in College Area, San Diego, CA 92115, managed by the El Cajon Boulevard Business Improvement Association as a successor to the Fair@44 International Market that operated for eight years under a lease from Price Philanthropies. The site houses Dojo Café and a rotating open-air marketplace where startup vendors from Mid-City's immigrant and refugee communities sell food, crafts, and specialty goods to walk-in customers along the El Cajon Boulevard corridor. The International Rescue Committee, the Karen Organization of San Diego, the Horn of Africa community group, Media Arts Center of San Diego, and the City Heights CDC collaborate on vendor recruitment and business development support for the market's participants, most of whom are women-owned and minority-owned micro-enterprises testing retail concepts before scaling to permanent storefronts. The same commercial stretch that channels students, campus staff, and neighborhood residents past University Square shopping center funnels foot traffic through the pop-up market on the east-west commute through the 92115 ZIP code. Pop-Up Winona's event calendar includes holiday markets accommodating more than 20 vendors, Domingo Colombiano cultural celebrations, healthy soil gardening workshops, Green Love Parades, and free all-ages dance parties. The lot sits at the intersection of El Cajon Boulevard and Winona Avenue, served by the Mid-City Rapid 215 bus that connects SDSU to downtown San Diego with a stop at the Winona Avenue station. Weekly Coffee and Chat sessions on Wednesday mornings provide a low-barrier networking space for vendors and community members, and the Love City Heights Open Mic runs on Friday evenings at the site. Tax preparation and business licensing support for market vendors connects through corridor resources including Pelayo Tax Service, which handles filings for sole proprietors and micro-businesses operating along El Cajon Boulevard. The market's incubator function has graduated vendors into brick-and-mortar locations along the boulevard, where the BIA's Stroll The Boulevard quarterly event continues to promote their storefronts. Pop-Up Winona accepts no admission fees and operates as a not-for-profit project of the City Heights Economic Development Collaborative.