Entrepreneurship agrees with two business partners who have started an outdoor accessories and garden center business on Dortches Boulevard.
Diane Dixon and Gina Allen, co-owners of Patios in Bloom, held a grand opening and drawing at their business this month, awarding gifts to six people.
Telegram photo / Alan Campbell |
Various decorations and furniture in the showroom Wednesday at Patios in Bloom.
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Dixon is a retired school teacher. She taught for 30 years at Rocky Mount Senior High School, three years at Cary High School and a year at Edwards Junior High.
"I've retired and been rehired," Dixon said. "It was time to go as a teacher, but I didn't want to do nothing when I got home."
Allen worked for Ryder Trucking for 20 years before deciding to form a business partnership with Dixon.
"Ryder was good to me, but I wanted to do something different before I got too old to have the nerve," Allen said. "Having the moral support from your spouse and family and their physical help to get the shop to the status that we wanted to portray – upper scale with quality merchandise – was critical.
"Diane and I wanted to bring something new to Rocky Mount – a year-round business rather than something seasonal."
Allen said the people involved in getting the business up and running provided strong support, especially their husbands, Denny Allen and Phil Dixon.
"We want send a thanks to everyone who helped put this together," Allen said. "There have been so many people.
"Our families physically came out and worked on our building, closing in places for storage, putting up yard rails and working on electrical stuff. They totally transformed this facility."
Dixon said the venture began as a home business, offering big planters and pots, as well as teaching people how to pot plants.
"We had a patio party at Gina's house a year ago," Dixon said. "It was very successful, so we started looking for a place to open a business.
"We found this site in September and have just kind of gone from there. We were open for Christmas and had a really good season."
Dixon and Allen have since traveled to the Atlanta market to find outdoor accessories they can offer customers.
"We look for unusual, quality things that you can't find often in Rocky Mount," Dixon said. "Business has been good, and we've had lots of great comments from our customers, who say they've 'found no place like this in Rocky Mount.' The community has supported us, especially The Chamber, as well as Denise and Joey Barden, owners of Social Butterfly."
Dixon said Patios in Bloom can help people beautify their yards and patios.
"We're having a ball in our new business," Dixon said. "There is a lot of hard work, and we're tired when we get home.
"But we're learning a lot of new things and meeting new people."
Patios in Bloom is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday and from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. Outdoor accessories offered by the business include Weather Print outdoor art, rustic and glazed pottery, resin whicker furniture and synthetic pine straw in colors.
