Welcome to Forum 360.

Thank you for joining us on our global outlook with a local view.

This is Leslie Ungar, your host today.

It began as home to the iconic Quaker Oats silos.

Then in 1975, with the smell of oatmeal cookies in the air, Quaker Square opened as a retail Mecca.

It was big news, even without the ability to go viral.

You could shop for shoes, baby clothes, dress up in vintage costumes and dine in a train car.

The Hilton opened five years later and it too was a big deal.

By 2015, Quaker Square was mostly closed.

It was a big deal until it wasn't.

In 2013, the University of Akron purchased the complex with seemingly high hopes that never materialized.

This very year, 2025, a group of Akron investors are now not just hoping, they are investing that magic will strike again.

That once again, Quaker Square will be a very big deal and a very big destination.

As we speak, it is being reimagined into mixed used residential and commercial space.

Now cutting edge for this century, from pickleball court to a cigar room to a rooftop bar.

You could say this group of local investors is putting their money where their vision is.

Joining us today are two of these key investors, Steve Demingo and Kyle Craven.

Steve is managing partner of Buckingham Law Firm, as well as an expert in state and local tax.

If you Google Kyle, Wikipedia will tell you he is an internet celebrity.

His day job, he is Vice President of Kyle Construction.

Welcome to Forum 360, both of you.

- Thank you.

- I'm going to start with you, Steve.

You're a successful attorney, but my guess is not a frequent investor.

So why did you choose to be a part of this project?

- Well, good question, Leslie.

One of the other investors, Joe Scaccio and his son, Carmen.

I do a lot of work for, I do lots of tax planning associated with dispositions of real estate.

As you mentioned, I have a significant Ohio tax practice and I do a lots of planning with respect to sales of real property.

Those that want to sell real property and acquire replacement property, and I pay tax on that.

And I've done that for 35 years.

And Joe Scaccio is one of my core clients and he was in the last year said, you know, I'd love to, actually probably 2 or 3 years ago said, I'd love for you to join me in on it, be a partner of mine and some investment in the future.

And so this came up and he asked me to join him.

And even though we all invested equally, he was not interested in my money.

But we all are.

All of the investors, I feel like are bringing something that’s unique to the table.

I'm bringing some legal expertise, some tax expertise.

Everybody at the table is bringing some great expertise and it's a lot of fun, a great group.

And so I'm honored to be part of it.

- That's a nice way to put it.

So Kyle, I mentioned a little different than Steve.

You've a lot of opportunities being in the business.

You have a lot of opportunities to invest.

What was it about Quaker that kind of spoke to you?

- Well, it was a really good opportunity to get at the time, you know, talking with the University of Akron and, you know, their, their plans for the space.

You know, they were really thinking they would have to demo it and, you know, demolish a big portion of it to be a sellable asset at that point.

So, you know, we originally looked at it and thought, well, we could probably save most of this or all of it.

And so it was one of these things where it was a good opportunity for us to show the university and the city that we could save this historic structure.

And it's also a fun project in my opinion.

You know, we get the opportunities to build, you know, apartments in the middle of a field, you know, wherever.

But, this was downtown Akron and everybody knows it and so, a little bit better than just your normal development.

- Now, many of us that live in the area drive past it.

We attend events at it, but we don't go, oh, gee, I think I want to reimagine this space and do something about it.

So, were you the only ones interested in reimagining it?

Or were there others?

- No.

Supposedly before us, there was a couple groups that have looked at it.

And these were more hotel focus groups, I know.

And so, a lot of them couldn't get the capital stack together and their financing together at the time.

And so, both of those deals, I guess, just fizzled out over the years.

- Now, is there a difference?

I use the word reimagining, but is there a difference between reimagining and redeveloping?

Or do you have to reimagine before you redevelop?

- I guess it's all about opinion.

I don't know, Steve.

What do you think?

- Well, I suppose I mean, there's so much there.

It is as you mentioned, iconic property and probably one of the most iconic properties, not only in Northeast Ohio, but the whole country.

And so we have a certain structure that exists that we know is not going to be touched for many reasons, mostly because we want to preserve its iconic stature— - Like the silos.

- Right.

The silos and so forth.

And so, I don't know.

It's a good question.

Are we reimagining or redeveloping?

You know, we are doing both.

In fact, the name of our group is Quaker Square Redevelopment Group.

- So let me ask you, when you invest, like, how patient do you have to be?

Like, how patient do you have to be as investors?

How patient do we need to be or impatient as people that hear about it and then like, we want to go tomorrow, you know, we want it to be ready tomorrow.

So what are we looking at like for a timeline as to something to see, to be ready to go to?

- Well, yeah, it will take years to do.

You know these things are very meticulous on how you put your capital stacks together is how you do your prints.

We're applying for grants and federal tax credits and so those things always take time.

And without them, the projects don't work.

You know, you have to apply and get these incentives to really make it pencil out.

But, you know, we're talking a couple year project before we can actually open anything up.

- But I think and what's critical is that we do the best we possibly can to get it right.

You know, we could fill that place, the place within probably three months if we wanted to with tenants.

We wanted to make it a destination.

And what makes it the destination?

- Yes.

- It's got to be unique.

It's got to be the finest restaurants, more than one restaurant.

It's got to be unique shops.

It's got to be something that people want to come, hopefully yravel hundreds of miles to.

And so we've debated this internally about and we've actually engaged a master planner out of Philadelphia to just really map it out for us.

What should this be?

What should it be like on the exterior?

What should be like on the interior?

What's it going to be like with the, you know, the landscaping and the urban design?

How do we, how do we do something that can be a catalyst for the whole community?

Catalyst for all the other draws in downtown.

And that's what we're working on.

So it's going to take time, but the primary reason it's taking time is we want to get it right.

- So, before we kind of look to the future, can we look back to say, 1975, before you were born?

- Correct.

Yes - Correct, right?

Okay.

So what lessons can you learn that of what, what are some things that they did right?

I mean, there was a buzz at the time.

What are some lessons that they did right that you might want to emulate?

And what are some things that went wrong that you might want to stay away from?

- Well, you know, all of the documents are really in the basement still, so it's really cool because even last weekend I was going through and looking at all their marketing fliers they did in the past, and there's 30 years of it.

So you can really kind of look through of their folders and look at other ideas they had and stuff.

And so, you get a good feel of what plans were.

I think some things they did really well at the time were bringing people to a centralized location to get them shopping.

You know, this was really before shopping malls were a thing.

And, you know, there's six floors really total over in the Quaker Square side.

And all of those were full with retail.

You know, today that I don't think works, you know?

I don't think people or, you know, malls are kind of dying off again.

And so, I don't think we would do six floors of retail by any means, but, you know, that at the time did work.

The hotel aspect of it and making it a destination that people can come and visit was definitely very key in its success and I think that's something we are definitely pursuing as well.

And so, that's something we are trying to get right again.

Some difficulties I think we see moving forward are going to be connectivity between the hotel and Quaker Square right now.

It's not very easy to get from one side to the next so, that's what our master planners are helping us with.

And really connectivity with, downtown, you know, because right now it is a pocket itself, and we really want to be connected to the surrounding neighborhood, which would be the, you know, John S. Knight Center, but also Main Street downtown.

And so, that is part of what we're looking at as well.

- I think what I've noticed, and we've toured it so many times and I've probably toured it 20 times, and Kyle has probably toured it 80 times.

And every time I tour it, nothing's changed but I look at it and I think, man, this is beautiful.

It is just a beautiful structure and what I think in terms of them getting it right is so much quality.

And in terms of their strucures and the silos are solid.

There's beautiful artwork, there's beautiful railings, there's beautiful chandeliers, there's beautiful woodwork and in the restaurants, I mean, it's just everywhere.

Just beautiful– They really did nice tile, nice brick here.

Just a lot of nice work they did.

They put a lot into that and a lot of thought into it.

- And they preserved a lot of the history too, which was great.

You know, when you walk around, you'll notice little plaques on the walls and they'll say, oh, this staircase came from Schumacher's mansion, you know, over on Mill Street or whatever it may be.

And these stained glass windows came out of this church and so, there's a lot of those cool little antiques around there that we're definitely going to preserve and incorporate into the new design.

- And so when we think about this property, we think, what other property in Akron, northeast Ohio has all of these attributes.

And so it's our responsibility and we, you know, take it seriously.

Man, we want to maximize all those attributes and have a nice legacy property, you know, for a long, long time.

And what has all these attributes?

We just described the silos, the beautiful artwork, the beautiful, you know, structures inside.

I mean, everything else is just an ordinary building.

- Now I know we hear like Cleveland has a low vacancy in their apartments, but what does your data tell you about people wanting to live somewhere in the downtown Akron area?

- Yeah, so there’s a need right now.

We definitely see that.

There's a lot of new developments going in as well, which is good.

We like competition for sure.

So we, you know, I think the unit or the city's expecting like, 1,500 more units they want downtown.

And so we're obviously not putting 1,500 units up, so we're welcoming to be a part of that.

But yeah, there is a need and it's competitive with the surrounding area, so.

We're all for it.

- Now if your magic wand worked, and I know that you're talking about different things, whether it's pickleball or cigar, this or that, but if your magic wand worked, and each of you could have anything in the re-imagined, redeveloped space, what would it be?

- You mean total all throughout the whole building?

- Just one thing.

Like if one thing, if you could have one thing, regardless of money or how easy or hard it was to build it.

- So one of the ideas that I floated around that I really would like to see is in the unused silos, which are in the middle, they’re about 150 feet high.

It's putting rock climbing in there.

So, you know, year round, rock climbing, indoor.

- I want to do it, but that's not so crazy.

- Yeah, it's not so crazy it's just getting the right operator in there to manage it and, you know?

- Ziplining once was my limit.

Magic wand.

Forget the cost.

Forget how easy or hard it would be if you could put one thing in there.

- Yeah.

My mind is more simple and it's probably more consistent with our business plan and that is just a really, really fine, affordable Italian restaurant.

And when we're talking to somebody that we believe is going to be there, and I just look forward to it because we're close friends with this individual, and it'll just be fun to be a gathering spot.

- Your second kitchen.

- Second kitchen to go in there— - Everyone’s second kitchen, right?

Maybe that's what you should call it.

Like, what is that in Italian?

You know, second kitchen.

- Just to have that one place you can go to and be very different and we anticipate is going to be very different than any other experience in Akron and that we would have great access to it as well.

- Okay, great.

Today we are talking to Kyle Craven and Steve Demingo, two investors in the reimagining redeveloping, Quaker Square area.

I want to go a little bit personally with each of you so that our audience can can hear a little bit about the person behind the investor.

So, Kyle, let's go back to 2012, okay?

The internet named you Bad Luck Brian.

And now refers to you as an American Internet celebrity.

Okay?

Because of a photo uploaded to Reddit, so could you please explain?

- Sure.

Yeah.

And actually, it wasn't the internet it was my best friend Ian, who's the one who came up with the name Bad Luck Brian.

But, I went to Archbishop Hoban High School here in Akron, and yearbook day was kind of one of my days that I get to do whatever I want to because my parents never bought yearbook photos.

So I went down to the thrift store, got a nice sweater vest, you know, Catholic high schools, you can't just wear anything but they allowed you to do sweater vest.

So I got one of those— - That’s really wild.

- It's progressive.

So, got, you know, it's a purple background.

Rubbed my eyes and gave a really weird smile and took the picture and that was it.

So, you know, we got our pictures back, I don't know, six months later or something like that and it looked great.

Thought it was funny.

Scanned it, put it on my Facebook and kind of sat there for four years or so.

And I was in college at the time and my buddy Ian was making memes and trying it out with different photos.

And this one's one of his memes he made and just posted it on Reddit and organically it exploded to this giant meme at the time.

- So, so that our audience knows, t-shirts, stuffed animals, novelty items sold by Walmart.

You starred in ad campaigns for companies like Volkswagen and McDonald's, featuring Bad Luck Brian.

You even appeared in a Slovakian viral campaign.

So what can you say about the last ten year period?

- So I call it my like, fun weekend project, you know?

Because we usually get to go and schedule trips, me and Ian.

So Ian's still a part of our mind on all the Bad Luck Brian stuff.

We're 50-50 partners, we split everything.

Because really, without him, I would have no fame at all.

So, it's kind of our excuse to get away, you know, we both are married and have kids and so, you know, we will schedule to go to Japan for, you know, events or, you know, Slovakia for a week to go do a campaign or, you know, so it's— - Gee, honey, I'm going to Slovakia for the weekend.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was one of those, you know, things where they, they originally reached out to us just to license the photo and we kind of talked them into letting us come out for a week and doing it in person and doing, you know, some in-person events.

And so, yeah, it's kind of a good excuse.

- So let me ask you in one word now as an adult professional, does that help or hurt you today?

- Help or hurt?

I don't think it's hurts by any means, you know, my family's construction company we build a lot of religious facilities, do tons of churches.

And at first I thought it could hurt because, you know, some of them are not in the best taste.

But we don't make them, you know?

So, the, there was a little bit of hesitation there, but mostly everybody that we built for that knows the story behind it thinks it's, you know, fun and cool and exciting, and so.

Yeah.

I don't think it's hurt me by any means.

- Now, it might pale by comparison, but truly, I don't believe it does.

So Steve is a tax and a local state and tax expert, right?

So that might not seem as exciting as internet celebrity, but you have argued in front of the Ohio Supreme Court, like 18 times, 16 times, some double digit times.

- Yes.

- Yes.

So tell us something that would surprise us about arguing in front of a Supreme Court.

- Well, how engaged they are.

I think they're very engaged, and they ask questions And that's the essence of the oral argument you have before them where they try to... Maybe throw you off of some questions and so forth and it's really good.

A fun experience, because you can even have a conversation with them.

And I think that part of it is you can start to feel that... Who, which justices were kind of in your corner based upon the questions they ask.

And they even try to help you a little bit with some of their questions.

- Now, by the time it gets to the Ohio Supreme Court, you've already been through many courts.

-Yes.

- Right?

And so you get to the Ohio Supreme Court and you have, what, 12 minutes or something?

- Right, 15.

- 15 minutes.

Now you have to boil down this whole case it has taken years to get to this point.

What does that teach us about clarity?

- Yeah.

It's important to always know your audience and the audience before the Supreme Court is an informed audience.

Many, many attorneys will give their standard openings and just recite a lot of numerical data and so forth.

But I always think about what the essence of the issue is.

And I lead with that and I just focus on that.

And the next thing you know, you're going to get bombarded with questions that can take you in to support whatever position you want to, you're trying to advance.

But so I always try to focus on the essence, the essence of that communication and everything flows from it.

- Which might be a good thing for all of us to remember, it's the essence, right?

Now you've gotten to know some of the Supreme Court justices over the years and your many times in front of them and in your many wins.

What would surprise us about a Supreme Court justice that most of us will probably never get to meet one, or spend time with one, or go to dinner with one.

So what would surprise us about a Supreme Court justice?

- Well, that they're ordinary individuals.

I've had dinner with a couple of them and they're very friendly.

They're very open to suggestions as to how the process can be improved.

And they're very approachable and they're very likable and nice.

- Okay.

Thank you.

So let's go back to Quaker for the last few minutes, okay?

So, you spent a day going to Philadelphia and New York to interview the architectural firm that will be in charge of this reimagining, okay?

So let me first ask you, did you also interview local?

- Yeah, yeah.

So we spoke and got proposals from local architects and firms here Cleveland and Akron.

And really it came down to a lot of these local firms we talked to don’t really specialize in adaptive reuse is the project, you know, type we’re doing.

And what we liked about the firm we went with, which was WRT out of Philadelphia, is that they not only specialize in and have a lot of experience in it, but they also have a lot of different scopes under their firm, which would be, you know, they have landscape architects and urban designers and just planners and architects.

So they brought a lot of the entire package that we need.

And then also they had a good connection with a guy that does a lot of market analysis.

And so they can bring the data as well on, hey, if we go with class A office versus a retail, this is maybe the pros and cons of those in the area and this is what we're seeing trends going with, and, you know, items like that.

So that's kind of why we went with a national firm.

Now moving forward, they’re only going to handle the master planning okay.

And so we are planning on using local firms for the build outs, you know, we're doing a hotel, and so like you know, we'll have to hire a local architect to help us do the design.

- Well, that leads me to my next and maybe one of my final questions.

There's going to be a physical transformation to this complex, right?

But, before that happens, there's also a psychological effect it's going to have on the community.

There's also a financial effect on the community.

So what are ways that the reimagining, redeveloping Quaker is going to affect Akron and this part of northeast Ohio, if you could talk, I don't, Steve?

- That's a good question as to how, it's got... We hope it's going to bring a lot of people in and our objective is to not only, you know, satisfy the interests of the surrounding communities, but again, make it a destination.

And part of it is to even enhance the convention center there and really, the more we can attract, the more then the Civic Theater is going to benefit.

The art museum is going to benefit.

Everybody locally is going to benefit from the success that we have.

We're going to raise the tide that everybody is going to follow and that's how we see it.

And that's why we’re again, it's tough to, we know we could get instant revenue, right?

But we're going to wait until we get it right.

- So I'm going to ask you to fast forward three years, five years, and it’s been reimagined.

Someone drives from Youngstown or somewhere and they come.

What are 1 or 2 words only that you want them to leave saying about this place.

- Fun.

Man, keeping it to 1 or 2 words is difficult to do.

Definitely fun because we want it to be.

- Okay, I'll take fun.

Steve, do you have one word you want to add?

- Unique.

Wow.

- Wow, I like wow.

Mark Twain said, an expert is an ordinary fellow from another town.

Sometimes it takes someone from out of town like Philadelphia to help us appreciate.

And as Mister Rogers would say, it's a beautiful day in this neighborhood.

Local investors including our guests today, Steve Demingo and Kyle Craven, and a firm from Philadelphia, will transform not so much a neighborhood as a complex, the Quaker Square complex.

Though silos have history and a million stories, the reimagination will make sure that the silos also have a future, a future that includes making Quaker a destination thousands will want to flock to.

At Forum 360, we offer our audience a global outlook with a local view.

I'm Lesley Ungar, thank you for joining us today.

Thank you, Kyle.

Thank you, Steve.

- Thank you.

Forum 360 is brought to you by John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Akron Community Foundation, Hudson Community Television, the Rubber City Radio Group, Shaw Jewish Community Center of Akron, Blue Green, Electric Impulse Communications, and Forum 360 supporters.