After 38 days of being closed following a six-alarm fire in the Belle View Shopping Center, Eagle and Empire has reopened! Northern Virginia area gamers and hobbyists rejoice! It’s been fully stocked and is ready for both it’s Grand Reopening and Small Business Saturday.
Courtesy of the Eagle and Empire Facebook page.
Many thanks to all who have helped my FLGS and the shopping center’s other affected businesses during this tough time. The Mount Vernon-Lee Chamber of Commerce and Belle View Merchants Association raised a total of $7,110 and the Eagle and Empire GoFundMe raised $3,400. That's a grand total of $10,510! Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to make a list for my next run to Eagle and Empire! DECEMBER 8, 2019 UPDATE I was in the shop today for the first time since it’s reopened and got to chatting with the owner. Apparently about half of the impacted businesses are still closed; he had pretty good insurance and was able to reopen quickly by comparison. Hopefully everyone will recover sooner rather than later.
This isn't the usual sort of thing I post on my blog, but I wanted to see if I could help boost the signal on this. Last week, just before midnight on October 20, the Belle View Shopping Center in Alexandria, VA got caught up in a six-alarm fire. Over 100 firefighters responded to battle the blaze. Several businesses were damaged, and one of them was my FLGS, Eagle and Empire Game Shop. A fundraiser has been set up to help the businesses and employees get back on their feet.
Thankfully the fire spared Eagle and Empire, but it sustained significant water and smoke damage according to their Facebook page. They also lost a lot of printed product as well. It was also by no means the only business affected. As of last Thursday, a total of 11 businesses remained closed with no clear idea of when they might reopen. Many of these are small businesses serving the community, and hundreds of people are being impacted by this.
As a result, the Mount Vernon-Lee Chamber of Commerce and Belle View Merchants Association have started a fundraiser to help with costs not covered by insurance and help those affected. If you have some spare cash, please consider a donation to the Belle View Shopping Center Fire Relief fundraiser. No amount is too small. Hopefully everyone will be back on their feet again soon!
Thanks for your time everyone! I'll get back to posting miniatures again soon. NOVEMBER 5, 2019 UPDATE Days after posting this, Eagle and Empire posted a GoFundMe fundraiser on their Facebook page. It can be found here. Funds will go to help with the shop's repair. According to the description, "The shop will need significant work done to repair the smoke and water damage and to replace damaged fixtures. The shop's insurance will help, but may not cover all the repair and rebuilding expenses, nor all of the lost income while the shop is being repaired." Thanks everyone! With our community pulling together, I'm optimistic that Eagle and Empire and the other affected businesses will reopen soon. Belle View Shopping Center is a fixture of the local community and means quite a lot to many different people.
