New developers breathing new life into Pineapple Square project in Sarasota

Fifteen years ago, as Sarasota seized on the recommendations a 2001 master plan aimed at bringing additional residents and more sophisticated commercial space to the city’s downtown, a group of brothers from Bryan, Ohio, quietly began buying up retail properties.

At the time, Sarasota’s Main Street was populated almost exclusively by mom-and-pop shops that closed at 5 p.m. weekdays and stayed dark on weekends, only a few restaurants worth visiting twice and several used bookstores.