TJ Leonard, left, and Tom Leonard of Tom Leonard’s Farmer’s Market. (BizSense file photos)
Some of Richmond’s longer tenured retailers passed the torch to new leaders during 2024, while others used the past 12 months to focus on other lines of business. Meanwhile, some up-and-coming brands expanded their footprints.
New leadership and pivots
This year marked one of change at a handful of long-running Richmond retailers, with new faces taking the reins at some and business pivots teed up at others.
Tom Leonard’s Farmer’s Market announced a new generation of leadership at the Short Pump grocery store, as TJ Leonard took over the role of president from his father and brand founder Tom Leonard. The younger Leonard plans to usher in new store locations and an expanded assortment of organic products to its shelves.
Also this year, Southside wine shop Oxford Cellars was sold by Richmond Caldwell and Ernest Walker to Chantel Crocker, who was formerly general manager of shuttered Fan restaurant Lady N’awlins. Oxford Cellars originally opened as a location of Once Upon A Vine more than decade ago and rebranded in 2019 when Caldwell and Walker took it over.
A trio of well-established local retailers announced plans to restructure their businesses in 2024, including Disco Sports, a decades-old sporting goods store in western Henrico. It announced plans in the spring to close its retail storefront and focus on selling uniforms and equipment to sports teams. The company is staying put, at least for now, at its location on Starling Drive, where it has been located since the early 2000s. The decision to stay in its current location was a reversal from previous plans to actively seek a buyer for the building and move to a new location.
Gail Held owner of Disco Sports, which this year made moves toward an exit from retail sales to focus on its business equipping teams with sports gear.
Richmond Camera shuttered its last retail storefront, in Carytown, and fully shifted into a focus on wholesale professional photography operations at its facility in Midlothian. That arm of the business handles the printing of school and sports team photographs among other products and services aimed at pro photographers, which had become the core operation of the business.
Southside bike shop Coqui Cyclery announced plans earlier this year to rebrand as Cornerstone Cycle and embark on a new focus on bike service and repairs, as opposed to bike sales that were core of its operations when it launched at the corner of Semmes and Forest Hill avenues more than a decade ago. Owner Clint Kronenberger said the change in business model was in response to larger trends in the bicycle retail industry. The pivot also followed an unannounced and largely unexplained weekslong closure of Coqui that started in late 2023 and ran into last January, which frustrated customers who temporarily couldn’t access their bikes or get clear answers. While new Cornerstone signage was up at the storefront by mid-December, it wasn’t clear when it would reopen with its new focus.
Store openings and new locations
A handful of retailers, some of them relatively new to the Richmond market, were quick to expand with more stores that opened this year, while others moved into larger spaces or returned to the market as brick-and-mortar concepts.
Used Lego retailer Bricks & Minifigs opened its second local store at 12421 Tennessee Plaza in Chesterfield this year, following the franchised chain’s entry into the Richmond area in western Henrico a couple years ago.
Bricks & Minifigs owners Carrie and Paul Indelicato inside their Short Pump store shortly after it opened in 2022. The local franchisees of the used Lego concept opened a store in Chesterfield in 2024.
East Coast Appliance opened a new location in the Tuckernuck Commons shopping center. It was the second Richmond-area store for the Norfolk-based appliance seller, which entered the local market with a Midlothian store in 2021.
Thrift store chain Uptown Cheapskate added another location this year by taking over the former Ledbury storefront in the Arts District downtown.
At least two local retailers upped the ante in 2024 with larger locations. In Carytown, Asian grocery store Tokyo Market nearly doubled its size with a move to 3030 W. Cary St., a couple blocks from its longtime, former location. Collectible toy store Toy Lair left Carytown in favor of a Broad Street spot four times as large as the previous location.
Two companies decided to reenter the brick-and-mortar game after previously shuttering local storefronts. Charlottesville-based chocolate company Gearharts opened a Short Pump store in February after a yearlong break from the Richmond region after shuttering a location on Libbie Avenue. Skin + Beauty Haus opened a new store in the Fan after going online-only following the closure of its storefront in Jackson Ward in 2020.