It’s been a busy few years for Sea Glass Lane, a coastal retailer with storefronts in Sanibel Island and Sarasota, Florida.
About six years ago, Owner Manon Brogan wanted to offer people in Sanibel Island a boutique full of products inspired by the sea and the perfect imperfections of sea glass. She wanted it to be full of clothing and jewelry that promotes an effortless lifestyle and delightful patterns and coastal colors. At that time, Brogan opened her boutique in Sanibel Island with help from her husband Scott. They opened a second boutique about a year later in Sarasota.
In the fall of 2022, Hurricane Ian hit Sanibel Island, which caused major damage to Sea Glass Lane’s storefront in that town.
“That storm surge brought 12 feet of water,” Brogan recalls. “The bridge to Sanibel Island collapsed, so it took almost a month before we were able to access the island. When we accessed the island to see the damage, everything was covered with water. We hoped we could salvage some things, but we couldn’t. Mold was everywhere, the walls, the ceilings. Everything was destroyed.”
She adds, “We knew it would take time for business and life to return to normal in Sanibel Island, so we just waited.”
Unsure as to whether she could reopen in Sanibel Island, Brogan says she focused her efforts on managing Sea Glass Lane’s Sarasota storefront.
Eventually, Brogan received a call from her landlord in Sanibel Island — he was repairing their shopping plaza and hoped that Sea Glass Lane would want to return. Brogan says some customers also requested that she return to that location. With that encouragement, she decided to prep that storefront to reopen, in hopes of opening by late 2024.
In the midst of prepping to reopen in Sanibel Island, the retailer faced another obstacle — Hurricanes Helene and Milton struck Sarasota, and Sea Glass Lane had to temporarily close its Sarasota storefront as well. Brogan says about 6 feet of water covered her store. She adds that she was fortunate she was able to salvage some inventory in the aftermath of Helene and Milton, but all the store’s furniture and fixtures needed to be replace as well as walls and floors.
After about two months of hard work, both Sea Glass Lane’s storefronts were ready to reopen just ahead of the Christmas holidays.
“So many times I wanted to give up, but it was such a good feeling to reopen at Christmas,” Brogan says. “The response was really good, and customers were happy we were back.”
But just weeks after reopening in late January, Sea Glass Lane faced one more challenge as a fire at the shopping plaza in Sarasota caused some minor damages to that location and the landlord asked tenants to terminate their leases.
“The fire had started in another unit and spread out, so we didn’t have too much damage,” says Brogan. “We were hoping that we would be able to do repairs and quickly reopen, but the landlord wanted to terminate all the leases.”
So Brogan acted quickly — she called a broker in the area, found an available storefront in Sarasota and moved just five days after the fire. Although the new storefront is small — roughly 700 square feet and about half the size of the old store — Brogan says she knew she had to make the leap to move to that spot. She wanted to make sure her employees had a job to return to and to continue providing coastal merchandise for customers in the area.
“For me, it was important that our employees could continue to work,” she says. “The store is smaller and traffic is not as great, but I think it was the right thing to do. I’m so happy we made that decision.”
Brogan admits that Sea Glass Lane had to make some big decisions these past few years, but she says taking things day by day as they came helped her. “There’s resilience. We know we can get through anything now,” she shares. “It’s funny, not that I want to experience another hurricane, another fire. That was terrible, and it’s difficult in the moment. But when you take things one day at a time, keep doing things, you won’t be paralyzed.”
Brogan says she hopes Sea Glass Lane can move its Sarasota storefront into a larger location in the near-term future, but she’s grateful to have both of her locations open in the meantime.
