Business notes: PostNet, infill, ‘Blunders’
 Ken and Kim Rodes have opened PostNet in Davidson. |
Here’s the latest installment of our occasional “Business notes” feature. In today’s column:
PostNet opens in Davidson; infill home fits into the Walnut Street neighborhood; Downtown Davidson Inc. to meet; game maker scores a hit with “Blunders.”
POSTNET OPENS DOORS
We SOHO types (small office-home office) no longer have to drive up or down the interstate. PostNet is now open in the Davidson Commons (Harris Teeter) shopping center, off Griffith and Jetton streets in Davidson. Owners Kim and Ken Rodes offer a menu of shipping, copying and business services.
The Rodes moved to Davidson from Charleston, S.C., in part at the suggestion of PostNet’s corporate headquarters, which was looking for a franchisee here.
“PostNet asked us where we wanted to open a store. They asked us did we want to come to Davidson,” Kim Rodes told DavidsonNews.net. Davidson is their only store, though other franchisees operate in nearby towns.
“We have family in the area,” Kim Rodes told DavidsonNews.net, so they were willing to consider the location.
PostNet offers copying and printing, binding, packing and shipping, mailboxes, and office supplies. Find out more about PostNet’s services at http://www.postnet.com/ The Davidson store is at 610 Jetton St., Suite 120. Telephone: 704-892-5656.
‘BLUNDERS’ TEACHES MANNERS
Davidson’s Aimee Symington is making headlines with her creation of a board game called “Blunders” that teaches manners.
Ms. Symington, a mother of two and founder of the children’s etiquette company Successful Kids Inc., was looking for a way to make it fun for children ages 5-10 to learn manners.
“Blunders” had its debut at the 2008 International Toy Fair in New York in February, where it was chosen as one of the “best new products” by TDMonthly, a toy industry publication.
Local reviewers are also offering praise. “I’ve never seen children get so excited about learning manners,” said Debbie Mikeal-Smith, an elementary school teacher who lives here in Davidson. “The children had so much fun playing ‘Blunders,’ I think because the ‘Blunders’ characters are like kids they know.”
Find out more about “Blunders” on the web at www.blundersmania.com. Ms. Symington even has a “Blunder Blog” on the site where she talks about “what’s new in Blunderville” and offers to take questions about etiquette.
The game is available at the Village Store on Main Street, the Tea House, Author Squad, Jewel Box, and Amazing Pottery. It’s also available through www.blundersmania.com.
INFILL DOESN’T HAVE TO BE DULL
 This Walnut Street home is the first in the Davidson Springs infill project |
Homebuilder Rodney Graham of John Marshall Custom Homes has completed and sold the first of nine houses in his Davidson Springs infill project off Walnut and Spring streets. The closing was scheduled for last Thursday, May 1.
It’s the only unit in the development that Mr. Graham has built so far. He’ll start work on a second home soon. The project is to include one affordable home, as required by Davidson’s planning ordinance. The project also will include four homes in the $500,000 range, including the first; three in the $700,000 to $800,000 range; and one other smaller home of about 1,500 square feet, Mr. Graham said.
The first house, on the former Reid property at 514 Walnut, is a 2,400-square-foot Victorian-style home. Designed by Moser Design Group of Beaufort, S.C., it includes a porch modeled in part after one on the front of the Copeland House on North Main Street near the Davidson Visual Arts Center.
Mr. Graham said he has tried to be sensitive to concerns about how new infill construction would mesh with existing homes in the neighborhood. So far, he said he’s had more compliments about this one house than anything he’s ever done.
“It’s just a good example of fitting in with the neighborhood and the community. It’s the right type of architecture for the old part of Davidson,” he said.
DOWNTOWN DAVIDSON MEETING
The next meeting of Downtown Davidson Inc. will be Thursday, May 8, at 7:30 a.m. at the new Harris Teeter, in Davidson Commons, off Griffith Street near Exit 30.
The meeting, in the store’s second floor meeting room, is being hosted by Harris Teeter and manager Jerry Furr 2d. (For more about Mr. Furr, see Brenda Barger’s Feb. 14 profile of him in her Around Davidson column.)
Downtown Davidson Inc. is a non-profit group that produces community events and promotes downtown business.
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May 5th, 2008 at 9:32 pm
I think this John Marshall Custom home is the perfect example of how a little bit of thought and sensitivity to environment/surroundings can result in a product that is both aesthetically pleasing and also marketable. I’m glad someone is building new homes in town that are of reasonable size. We only have so much land left and intelligent use will be paramount. If I see another French-country stone/brick house that eats a half-acre of Davidson’s land, I’m going to vomit. Its not that I object to fabulous displays of wealth or French-country architecture, I just wish appropriate settings would be chosen that do justice to such elaborate styles (and these typically are not in town). All that is to say that I’m glad Rodney is building with some thought, and I hope other builders would use this home as an example of how it is possible to build a successful product in the older part of town.