GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) – Grand Rapids leaders want input on business downtown, and beginning this week, people can share their feedback with the touch of their phone screen.

If you’ve walked through downtown Grand Rapids lately, you may have seen signs QR codes on buildings asking the question, “What do you want here?”

“It’s an election year and we always hear this phrase about what the American people want. Well, no one’s ever asked me. They’ve probably never asked you,” Richard App, retail retention and attraction specialist for Grand Rapids, said.

The QR codes have been placed on 12 vacant storefronts. The Grand Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce, Downtown Grand Rapids, Inc. and the city want the community to help decide what should fill those spaces.

“So that we can go after the right businesses,” App explained. “And the more data we’re going to collect, we can get (the comments) to the business owners, we can get them to the building owners, to the property managers, to the brokers.”

Scanning the QR code will bring users to a webpage asking seven questions including about what type of businesses they would like to see, whether they work or live nearby and how often they are downtown.

“We’ve got a lot of really amazing upcycling and vintage stores downtown, record stores downtown, so we want to get people to compliment that,” App said.

App said there are people with plenty of ideas.

“I’ve heard people talk about bakeries, about a Greek restaurant,” App said. “A toy store is another we’ve heard; bookstores are something we’ve heard.”

According to App, the retail occupancy rate for downtown Grand Rapids sits around 84%. He’s hopeful that the QR campaign can help drive that figure higher and bring more vibrancy to the area.

“It’s one of those things (that) it’s so simple that it just might work,” App said.

App says as more data is collected, he plans to share the results with the public. There’s no timeline on how long the campaign will last.