Crowds show up to visit new Rocky top attraction: Coal Creek General Store
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A visitor to the new Coal Creek General Store during Saturday’s grand opening event checks out the freeze-dried cricket snacks offered in half-ounce packs in the store. - G Chambers Williams III
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With a band playing in the parking lot outside and owner Jason Deel frying bologna on the grill out back, hundreds of people turned out Saturday for the grand opening of the new Coal Creek General Store in downtown Rocky Top.
Deel and his wife, Natalie, opened the doors to their new business at 331 S. Main St. earlier in the week, but held off the celebration until the weekend.
Natalie Deel spent most of the day making the Coal Creek Miner’s Bologna Sandwiches – the store’s specialty – in the deli area at the rear of the store, as orders for the item piled up.
She even accommodated those wanting their sandwiches spicy by adding what quickly became a popular commodity in its own right, the “38 Proof Bourbon BBQ Sauce.” It’s offered for sale in 12-ounce glass bottles, as well as being available as a condiment on the sandwiches.
Customers browsed the many local and unusual items on the shelves, including varieties of sauces, bottled spices and rubs, honey, candy, and T-shirts.
One item that drew a lot of attention – but few sales – was the packages of dried, spiced crickets, called “Crick-Ettes.”
The half-ounce packs – with about 10 crickets each – were offered in three varieties, spiced with salt and vinegar, bacon and cheese, or sour cream and onion ($3.99 each). Store clerk Billy Boyd said the treats are loaded with protein, and he said the salt-and-vinegar ones “are pretty tasty.”
Manager Haley Jo Braden was staffing the register, and at times there were as many as a dozen people in line waiting to check out with their selections.
The store is filled withold-style country store merchandise, including candies and vintage bottled soft drinks rarely seen these days, along with homemade fudge, freeze-dried candy, pet treats, Moon Pies, Coal Creek store T-shirts and mugs, and locally sourced items such as honey, soaps, beef jerky, eggs, candles, handcrafted items and more.
Coal Creek General Store is in the former space of the Lake City Auction House, in a building constructed in 1900. Jason Deel, a Clinton auctioneer and real estate agent, says he believes it’s the oldest building still standing in the downtown area.
Deel says the store is meant as throwback to the Appalachian country stores of the past, using the original name of the town that is now known as Rocky Top.
For now, the store is open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Thursday, Friday and Saturday, and from 1-5 p.m. on Sunday.
The store also sells through its website, coalcreekgeneralstore.com/.