This column originally appeared in the February 25, 2021 edition of the “Greenville Advocate”. It is included here because it gives more detail in conjunction with “Bond County Day Trip 2—Pride of Pocahontas”, that I think you may find enlightening.
Every town needs business owners who fervently believe in its future and Pocahontas has some of those “true” believers, who have dedicated their lives to their businesses and serving their community.
A town can also benefit from an injection of “new blood”, once in a while, to help reinvigorate the current business community and Pocahontas was lucky enough to have Don and Jennifer Rick arrive on the scene about five years ago and become two of the town’s major boosters.
Since then, they have joined other local merchants in trying to re-juvenate their adopted hometown as a viable marketplace, by investing in the community and doing major rehab work on five structures, which now house five disparate businesses, plus their living quarters.
In a recent interview, the Ricks agree whole-heartedly that Pocahontas has “lots of potential and available buildings and that things are on the upswing”. And they are important contributors to that upswing.
Working on ‘last’ project
Catching them at a moment of rest, is difficult. But after five years of hyper-activity with two full-time jobs and devoting all their week-ends and evening hours to renovating properties, finding renters, and running their retail businesses, they can finally take some time off from creating their living quarters in the old Methodist Church and discuss their journey in Pocahontas over the past five years.
The main floor of the church is their home and they have worked on it steadily over the years and, although, much has been done, they still have more to do to meet their self-imposed completion deadline of Christmas 2021.
“This is our last project” so says Don, and they have a couple of rooms left to complete. Jennifer added, “When this is completed, we would like to have an open house, because there are so many people who are curious about their old church and we’d like them to see it.”
Opportunities knock
The couple claims to be careful planners, but their entrepreneurial spirit seems to have consistently changed or expedited their plans.
The Rick’s have been married for 12 years and early on they made a two-year plan for their future.
“That plan only lasted two weeks”, said Jennifer, before they quite unexpectedly came across an antique store in Pocahontas that was going to sell at auction. They were interested, because they had experience in the antiques business.
They took a preliminary look, talked to their banker, and in a short time, ended up with their first venture in the village. The business was an antique store that had been closed for three years. They re-opened the business as a mall on May 28, 2015 and named it Pocahontas Antiques: a purchase they both agree has made their other ventures possible.
Pocahontas Antiques is open on Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Find them at pocahontasantiques.com.
The Strand Theater
Since both of the Ricks had full time jobs: Don as a meat cutter at Schnucks and Jennifer in the landscaping business, they understood that they had to be willing to work long hours, especially on the week-ends. Fortunately, Jennifer’s work allowed her to be off most of the winter months. Keeping their jobs allowed them to invest their profits back into their businesses, which proved to be fortuitous.
After running the antiques mall for a year, they heard about an old theater with an adjoining mercantile building that was probably going to be torn down. The couple has a keen sense of history and began to brainstorm if the buildings might have a useful purpose in the future.
They learned that The Strand Theater had been a hardware store from the late 1800s until 1921 and was later converted into a movie theater, until it closed in 1946.
The adjoining building had been a butcher shop and the DeLaurenti Store from the 1920s until the late 1960’s. It catered largely to the needs of the workers and families connected with the Pocahontas mine. In 1943, the mine closed and the local economy took a downturn.
There had been no water or electricity to the building for over 50 years and it had been used for storage by an owner who was a hoarder. They remember there was barely room to walk through the buildings when they took a tour.
They thought The Strand could be converted into a 1940s themed events center for about 100 people and eventually host wedding receptions and other functions. They had longer range plans to restore the old DeLaurenti store into a 1930s era mercantile and convert one end of the building into a sweet shop.
18-month project
The deal for the buildings was closed in July of 2016 and renovations were started with Jennifer posting their progress almost daily on Facebook. “It was amazing how many local people followed our progress,” said Jennifer. “Their interest really kept us going,” she added.
Initially, the outside of the buildings was upgraded, but then the real work began. Every floor joist had to be replaced and it took 18 months before it was ready for a grand opening in March of 2018.
Don admits to being fond of the nostalgia from the ‘30’s and 40’s and it readily shows in the restoration work he has done.
The grand re-opening of The Strand was a gala affair with the SIU jazz band performing and a dinner provided. Rentals can be arranged for The Strand at The Mercantile and Sweet Shoppe.
The Mercantile and Sweet Shoppe
After The Strand’s gala opening event, the couple gave themselves a self-imposed deadline of six months to have the DeLaurenti Store re-opened as the Pocahontas Mercantile and Sweet Shoppe. They made it by September of 2018 and eventually converted some backroom living space into an ice cream shop, which opened in 2019.
The Mercantile has ceiling-high shelves chock full of jars of novelty candies, making this a place to find items long gone from other stores. The intent was to replicate a 1930’s general store and many of the items for sale have been made by area craftsmen, which are carefully chosen by the Ricks.
Those vendors include items created by: blacksmiths, candle makers, rug makers, cast iron refinishers, a broom maker, a potter, a basket weaver, seamstresses, quilters, a florist and local book authors to name just a few.
In the Sweet Shoppe, you can find over 100 flavors of soda, 19 novelty ice creams and 350 varieties of candies.
The bakery features items being brought in from a couple of different area bakeries and includes European style pastries and old-fashioned baked goods.
“By using several different bakeries, we can choose the best that each has to offer and that has made our sales continually increase,” said Jennifer, “and yes we do take orders in advance.”
The Mercantile and Sweet Shoppe are open on Friday, Saturday and Sunday and can also be found on Facebook.
Church becomes home, business
As if those projects weren’t enough, the local United Methodist Church became available for sale. The church had moved across the street into a newer smaller church building that they had purchased and after five years of having the old church building set idle, they decided to sell it.
They approached the Ricks, who soon developed an interest. Why buy a church? “We just thought it needed us to rescue it,” said Don. “We didn’t want to see it leveled and just become a parking lot, it just had too much history.”
But what do you do with a building that large? They decided to look for a renter for the basement and soon found one in an acquaintance of theirs, who along with three others rented it to house The Refined Cellar, a novelty retail shop, which is open Friday -Sunday. The building purchase was made in March of 2017 with the shop opening in the basement in September of 2017.
The upstairs was destined to become their living quarters and a large amount of work has been done to it, but finishing the project has now become their number one priority.
The water company building
Because of all the renovation work he has done, Don has always needed his own shop and office. He was also anticipating retiring after 44 years as a meat cutter and being around full time, so he started looking for the appropriate space.
The Bond-Madison Water District had moved into the former bank building in the heart of the village and their smaller facility a block south was available…and it had a garage.
The offices were renovated in hopes of attracting a tenant, while the garage was converted into a functional facility for Don. For his own office, Don used repurposed building materials. The deal closed in March of 2020 and renovations were started in July.
After putting the word out on Facebook, it wasn’t long until a renter, the University of Illinois Cooperative Extension Service, was found. Due to pandemic restrictions, they were unable to move in until just recently.
Marketing efforts
Since they started the renovation of The Strand in 2015, Jennifer has posted their progress almost daily on Facebook. They also use that medium to actively support other businesses in Pocahontas.
Another effective use of Facebook has been the frequent updates about what is being brought into the bakery each day.
The Ricks are also very willing to participate in any village event that will help draw people to town. One fairly recent effort was the Small Business Saturday Vendor Market that was co-hosted by The Strand and The Fainting Goat, a local eatery. Both establishments were filled with local vendors and it was successful enough that a follow up event is being planned for this spring.
Overcoming the pandemic
As timing would have it, Don’s planned retirement coincided not only with the purchase of the former water company building, but also the COVID-19 pandemic.
Again, their plan was well-conceived, but changes out of their control were coming that would alter it. The antique mall and The Strand were mandated to be closed for 71 days, but the silver lining was the Mercantile and Sweet Shoppe, which was allowed to remain open because of its bakery.
At first business fell off, but by April customers had returned.
“Our business has done really well and continues to grow.”, said Jennifer. “Pocahontas folks have been very supportive of us all the time we have been here.
“We also think what we saw were people wanting to get out and go, but not be around large crowds”, she added. “We also sense that they want to shop small and to help small businesses.”
One of the main lessons the Ricks say they have learned is that if you make something nice, people will treat it better and they have been the leading proponents of making Pocahontas a nicer place for customers to visit and in which to shop.
To be sure of when the business you are interested in is open, please contact the Ricks at 618-669-2333 or by email at: pocahontasantiques@hotmail.com or on Facebook at: pocahontasmercantileandsweetshoppe.
I am Nancy Schmitt Grimmer. My grandfather Fred Schmitt operated the Strand Theater. He lived in Pocahontas with wife Bertha and children Edna, Fred, and Wilbur. The children attended school
In Pocahontas.
I would like more information .
I live in Bridgeton Mo.