We're in the process of merging our Palmerton Tasting Room online site with our new Wine & More on 1st brick and mortar shop. (www.PalmertonTastingRoom.com)
For those who do not know, we started out in Palmerton in 2019, sub-leasing the back room of This N That at 380 Delaware Ave in Palmerton. Once Covid hit we were allowed to remain open as an essential business but THEN they added 25% occupancy. For anyone who remembers our original shop, to say it was tight quarters would be an understatement. So we were forced to close our doors at the end of May 2020. We had looked around Palmerton for a larger place but we didn't want to rent, we wanted to buy. There was one location almost across the street from our original shop but we could not agree on a price so we walked away and simply did online orders.
In July, Jenny, from Jenny's Sweets texted me to let me know a property was going on the market, it was lovely but too small for us, while looking at it I voiced my concerns to the realtor, Kim, who pointed across the street and said "That is going up this weekend." Low and behold it was a property that had caught my eyes every time we drove through Lehighton on our way out of Jim Thorpe. We were halfway through the showing when we made an offer for the asking price. We closed in August.
It's been up and down since then. I got my LCB clearance for the new shop the first week of October, we expected to be open by Halloween....then zoning became an issue. I assumed that since it had always been a retail location that we were good to go. Oh, how wrong I was. I had NO IDEA how many 'retail classifications' there were. So we had to have stamped architectural plans created and submitted. We knew an ADA bathroom would be required so I contacted Ben Walbert on Sunday and he was there by Tuesday to help us out. Sadly he passed away suddenly four days later. We did get plans drawn up and submitted only to be told that the area was too large and that a fire exit needed to be added. Normally this wouldn't be such an issue but there is no back yard to my property which is on an extremely steep incline. As in the street level at the front of the building becomes 3 stories up by the time you reach the back. And, to keep LCB compliant I must have certain areas under lock and key at all times.
So now it's the beginning of December, we finally have plans approved that require the ADA bathroom and a fire exit that will cause me to lose one of my loading docks and cost about 12k more than I budgeted for. We are back to doing online orders only until March when, fate willing, we will finally have all our construction, the 3 different inspections required, and our occupancy clearances done.
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