Businesses relocate, rebuild after fire totaled their building on Patterson

Precison Print & Copy’s old space on Patterson remains fenced off and awaits a date with demolition. (BizSense file)

It’s been nearly four months since a fire destroyed the office building at 10615 Patterson Ave. and left a handful of small local businesses displaced.

And after pondering their futures, grappling with insurance companies and searching for space, at least a few of those businesses have found new homes and are trying to get back to business as usual.

Precision Print & Copy, a 30-year-old commercial printing company that had been a longtime tenant in the Canterbury Green retail and office strip center on Patterson before the late January blaze, is back up and running in a new space nearby.

Co-owner Rhonda Tanir said the business was out of commission for nearly two months while it searched for a new home and ordered new equipment needed to fully reopen.

Precision’s new space at John Rolfe Commons.

It landed in a former Amish furniture store next door to Publix at 2260 John Rolfe Parkway in John Rolfe Commons. Its landlord in the shopping center is the same as it had on Patterson: locally based Wilton Cos.

Tanir, who co-owns the business with husband TJ, said Precision moved into the new space in March. While they’re happy to be reopened and have orders coming in, she said they are still recovering.

The fire destroyed its client art files that it kept on hand for repeat orders and meant putting a lot of orders on hold. She said the business is still playing catch-up and waiting, hopefully, to see how many of the 300 pre-fire clients return with new orders or if they’ve gone elsewhere. Precision does a lot of printing for churches, schools, nonprofits, restaurants and other small businesses.

“It’s too soon to tell what that disruption means to us as far as the client database,” Tanir said. “We’ve had a lot of them for a very long time but we’re so backlogged it’s hard to tell if there’s any shakeout.”

But Tanir said there are reasons to be optimistic.

First, she said the business was “over-insured,” which has come in handy as they’ve ordered $250,000 in new equipment and supplies.

“Our insurance company took care of us really quickly,” she said.

Second, Tanir said they are enjoying their new space and surroundings. Canterbury Green was an older complex with smaller windows and not much to see in the vicinity. That’s changed for the better at John Rolfe Commons.

“It’s a much better view, if you will. We’re looking out big windows into blue sky and green grass,” she said.

Lastly, Tanir said she’s optimistic that the new location will not only bring in previous clients, but also drive new business.

“We hope our new location regenerates whatever we lost,” she said.

Rachel Duke relocates

Rachel Duke and Luna’s space after the fire.

One of Precision’s customers is a former building mate on Patterson that’s also in rebuild mode.

Rachel Duke, who runs her namesake clinic that does Botox and other injection treatments, has reopened in a new space in Short Pump.

Duke had moved into the Patterson building just seven months before the fire in a suite she shared with Chelsea Martin’s Luna Aesthetics & Spa. The two had spent about $175,000 to outfit their spaces.

For a short time after the fire, Duke said she and Martin relocated to nearby coworking space Balance in order to start seeing clients and bring in at least some revenue.

Rachel Duke (left) and Chelsea Martin.

But Duke needed a more permanent space. She said she lucked out through a connection made by a neighbor and wound up leasing 1,200 square feet of excess office space at 1630 Wilkes Ridge Parkway, in the West Creek offices of Virginia Oculofacial Surgeons.

Duke said the office was basically move-in ready and gave her space for two treatment rooms with a reception and prep areas. She moved in in March. The only drawback: an increase in rent.

“The biggest slap in the face that I had to realize was rent,” Duke said. “With (the old space on Patterson) being an older building our rent was very reasonable. I’m paying a significant larger amount of rent (on Wilkes Ridge), but I just had to make a business decision as far as my patients’ needs.”

Duke said she’s back to employing two nurses and a receptionist and added that her former suitemate Martin remains at Balance and has three employees at Luna.

Duke said she was among the tenants in the Patterson building that were “under-insured” and was stuck fighting with her insurance company to try to get reimbursed for equipment and supplies lost in the fire.

“There were days where I thought, ‘Gosh, do I even want to continue working to rebuild everything?’” Duke said.

She said she was spurred along by the support of customers and peers in the industry.

“What kept me going was getting the little notes and care packages from colleagues in the community,” she said. “It’s been very refreshing to see how well the patients have reached out with warm messages and words of encouragement.”

Annie Mae & Wes begins to heal

Annie Mae & Wes’s suite, its front door in red, a few days after the fire.

Brady Zizzo said the support of her customers has also kept her spirits up and some business coming in as she and her company Annie Mae & Wes have worked to rebuild after the fire.

Annie Mae & Wes makes cheerleader hair bows, a niche that last year helped the company land on the RVA 25 list of the region’s fastest-growing companies.

After the fire, Zizzo found herself, like Duke, under-insured and pondering how best to reopen and keep her dozen workers employed.

Her company was without a dedicated space for about a month while Zizzo fulfilled some orders from her home.

Brady Zizzo at last year’s RVA 25 awards ceremony.

With the help of Andy Walsh from Sugar Oak Realty, Zizzo ultimately found a new space for her bow-making and shipping operations at the corner of Patterson Avenue and Lauderdale Drive.

She said the space is slightly smaller and about twice the cost of her previous office, but that it gives her what she needs to begin to ramp back up and prepare for the bow industry’s busy season from mid-May to September.

“We’re really happy there,” Zizzo said. “The best thing for me is people have been really supportive. I don’t think I’ve lost a lot of customers. I think we’re going to be OK.”

Zizzo hopes that the fire wasn’t enough of a setback to prevent Annie & Wes from regaining its spot on the RVA 25 list.

“It definitely knocked me down a few pegs. But I’m optimistic,” she said. “I definitely learned a lot about insurance and a lot about having to start over.

“It just feels like coming back from an illness a little bit,” she said of recovering from the fire. “It’s like I feel OK, but I don’t quite feel like going for a jog just yet. The thing from the beginning was get to open, because if you’re open you can heal.”