Peoria Camera Shop plans to reopen with new owner

PEORIA — Local photographer Ava Kamm acquired a little bit far more than she prepared when she went to check out out the clearance sale at Peoria Camera Shop previously this yr.

Kamm, whose function features portraits, authentic estate pics and the canine of Peoria, stopped in to glance for digital camera tripods and other tools right after the spouse and children of late owner Bill Dobbins announced the store’s 84-yr operate would close soon after Dobbins’ death.

“The guys that worked there informed me I ought to purchase the digicam shop,” she informed the Journal Star. “I believed it in fact sounded kind of fun, then I did the study and figured out how it could all operate. … Turns out, it is a great very little enterprise.”

Peoria Digicam Shop very first opened in downtown Peoria in 1937, relocating from Monroe Road to Key Avenue, then shifting to the Metro Centre in 1990.

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As a longtime client, Kamm knew she preferred to carry on the store’s gross sales of cameras and machines, as nicely as prints of photographs. But immediately after reopening later on this month, she reported she ideas to add extra offerings to attractiveness to a broader variety of prospects. That features offering much more pictures courses and some workshops for photographers, she stated.

She also hopes to seek the services of a single additional total-time employee and add a section-time employee. She stated she has currently employed again the store’s two longtime personnel.

“They actually are invested in the organization. They want to see it grow, and they enjoy functioning right here,” Kamm reported.

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The area has been closed for about six months for renovations. Kamm hopes to reopen the photograph-printing facet of the business by month’s end, targeting April 25 for a smooth opening. She acknowledged it could just take a minor for a longer time to deliver back again digicam and devices inventory. But, she hopes, it ought to be in by the start of neighborhood photographers’ “busy year” that features graduations and summer time weddings.

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She ideas to set apart part of the store room for a photograph studio, in aspect to continue on her do the job photographing location canines and that includes rescue canine but also to offer you on a rental foundation to other photographers who don’t have their individual studio space.

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Kamm is relieved she came into the shop when she did.

“They just about experienced offered up and accepted that they were not going to come across a buyer,” she claimed. “The stars just aligned.”

This post initially appeared on Journal Star: Peoria Digital camera Shop programs to reopen in Metro Centre with new owner