Thrifty Treasures home décor set to open Wednesday in downtown Rocky Top
Sandy Smith, co-owner of the new Thrifty Treasures shop in downtown Rocky Top, works to arrange some of the merchandise on Monday (March 4) in preparation for the store’s opening today (March 6) at 305 S. Main St. (photo:G. Chambers Williams III )
Owners Sandy Smith of Powell and here sister, Susan Riggs of Rocky Top, will be operating the store in the building that formerly housed the Rocky Top Dentistry practice before it moved to a new location in July 2022.
“We will have home décor merchandise, new and used, including vintage items and antiques,” Smith said as she and some helpers worked to set the store up on Monday.
“We had a store here about 10 years ago,” she said. “We both love doing this, and we’re hoping for the best. This is a great spot.”
Smith is originally from Andersonville, and graduated from the former Norris High School before it was merged into the new Anderson County High School, she said.
She said that she and her sister are excited about the recent birth of new businesses in downtown Rocky Top, including Coal Creek Coffee, run by Jesse and Nikki Dymond, and the Coal Creek General Store, opened last September by Jason Deel, a Clinton auctioneer and real estate developer.
Both of those are close by, also on South Main Street.
Rocky Top Mayor Kerry Templin has been “very supportive of our efforts to bring a new business to downtown,” Smith said.
For his part, Templin said he welcomes Thrifty Treasures to the growing list of new downtown businesses.
“We’re excited for them to open,” he said. “We also have an antique shop opening soon on the corner of Main and Sixth Street.
“The positivity of the people out there is just great.,” Templin said. “I love seeing this activity in town. I believe a lot of this can be attributed to Jason Deel and the Dymonds with their new stores. They have offered encouragement for others to come in.”
Coal Creek Coffee, at 224 S. Main St., opened last April, and has quickly become a downtown Rocky Top institution.
The building they’re in, which also houses a hair salon and pest-control company, is owned by Jesse Dymond’s parents, who live in Howell, Michigan, where Jesse grew up.
Templin said the new Thrifty Treasures store is in the former dental office, which was built in the 1990s.
“That previously was the site of the old Powell 5 & 10 cent store, which burned in the mid-’80s,” the mayor said.
“Maria Hooks is putting an antique store in at Fifth and Main streets in the very near future,” Templin said.
The mayor said there also have already been inquiries by someone considering putting up a new building next door to the Coal Creek General Store, where a two-story building dating to 1925 burned down on Jan. 23, resulting in a fatality among the tenants of the apartments on the second floor.